Rebecca Solomon with her mother Sharon Reed

A FAMILY which endured a traumatic fire tragedy 40 years ago has called for greater compassion from a housing association’s repairs services after three fires in their own flat since the summer.

Rebecca Solomon is in dispute with Clarion over the cause of the fires in her two-bedroom home and said this week that officials “do not know what’s going on in people’s lives”.

While she blames faulty electrics, the housing provider has suggested the use of extension leads were at the root.

After one of the fires, in December, Ms Solomon said she found herself sleeping in a car overnight – the day before giving birth to her third child at University College Hospital.

After giving birth she could not be discharged home and was kept in hospital for five days until she was sent to various temporary accommodation – including everywhere from a single room with a bed on the floor in a service station off the M1, to a luxury hotel in Angel where a portion of chips cost £10.

The incidents have evoked memories of a horrific arson attack which killed two people in 1982.

Two relatives were killed in a shocking case in 1982

Sharon Reed, Ms Solomon’s mother, lost her sister and her niece when her childhood home in Caversham Road, Kentish Town, was set alight.

She said: “My mother became a paraplegic. I watched my mum jump out of that and I was telling her to get up, but she was saying she couldn’t get up. I was just 16.”

Ms Reed’s stepfather was later jailed for life and died in prison. The shocking arson case went to an Old Bailey trial and ended in a conviction.

Ms Reed said: “I have lived with that, and now to see my own child going through this, well it is just bringing everything back to me. I’m worried what will happen when they go to sleep. It worries me that she is now in this position with my grandchildren. I worry every single minute of the day for them being in here. I just wish people would talk to people like you would be spoken to. As you never know what has been going on in people’s lives.”

Ms Solomon added: “After that fire in December, they told me not to return to the house – so we thought, where do we go? It’s 8pm. The boys are in their pyjamas. I am 37 weeks pregnant. So we just sat in the car.

“The hospital wanted me to go home as the baby wasn’t ready, but I didn’t have a home to go to. It was 3.30am. Where were we going to go? So we basically all slept in the car.

“I just want to get out of this house because it feels dangerous,” she said. “The children are scared to go in the house, it doesn’t feel like a home.”

Ms Solomon went to Parliament Hill School and has featured several times in the New Journal winning athletics medals in London-wide sporting events and even meeting the Queen.

A Clarion spokesperson said: “We have been in contact with Ms Solomon to provide support on a number of occasions including following reports about small fires in the property. On each occasion our team have carried out safety checks in the property which have all passed. They also provided advice on the correct use of extension leads to avoid overloading and prevent risk of fires.

“The safety of our residents and the neighbouring community is our top priority so we will have to continue to work with Ms Solomon to address these issues.”