Chief executive Jenny Rowlands came to talk to Ellen Nkomo

AN NHS worker dramatically chained herself to the council’s headquarters on Wednesday evening – telling staff she had been fobbed off for years over housing repairs.

Ellen Nkomo, who has lived for several decades in Elm Village, Camden Town, said she was left with no option but to take direct action.

She locked herself to a pillar at Camden’s 5PS offices in King’s Cross, sending its security staff into a tailspin.

Ms Nkomo insisted on speaking to a housing manager – but was told they had all gone home.

Camden’s chief executive, Jenny Rowlands, later appeared and made a series of promises after a lengthy discussion with Ms Nkomo, as a colleague took detailed notes. She unlocked herself after an hour. Police were also on the scene.

Ms Nkomo told the New Journal: “So many people in Camden are going through what I am going through. But today I just thought, I’ve had enough. I don’t care anymore.

“When you come here you see how they spend all this money on buildings like this, but they should go to people’s homes and see how people are living. “It’s diabolical. People should be warm and comfortable in their homes. It’s a basic right.”

Ellen Nkomo fastens herself to pillar with a series of locks

She added: “The stress of it all is the thing. You ring the council, they say we’re on lockdown and there’s nothing they can do. They don’t give two dumplings about working-class people living in the backstreets. It weighs you down, it changes your mood. Everything is related to the conditions in which we live.”

The council has said it will urgently send someone to see what repairs need to be done in the coming days, with Ms Rowlands telling Ms Nkomo she was taking responsibility.

Her complaints included the need to solve a rats problem, as well as damp, poor quality windows and leaking radiators. Security guards initially suggested they would seize the New Journal’s phone if any photos or film of the incident was taken.

Ms Nkomo, who grew up in Kentish Town and Somers Town and went to Maria Fidelis School, worked as an auxiliary nurse in the Ear Nose and Throat Hospital when it was in Gray’s Inn Road, King’s Cross, before switching to roles at the Elizabeth Garrett Anderson in Euston, and later the Royal Free.

Her parents came to Camden as exiles from South Africa and she recalled how they would take her on anti-apartheid protests in Trafalgar Square.

She was there when Nelson Mandela unveiled the plaque to activists Ruth First and Joe Slovo, who her parents knew, in Lyme Street in 2003.

She said: “The NHS, it’s a tough job. Very difficult. I see a lot of elderly nurses who have been there 40 to 50 years and they are struggling.”

A Camden Council spokesman said: “We are arranging to visit this resident’s home to look at the issues reported and do whatever we can to put these right. We are really sorry the resident needed to come to our offices. We want all our tenants to be living in safe, well-maintained and warm homes.”

They added: “Our repairs team work throughout the week to fix issues across our 22,000 council homes. “Residents can now speak to us about problems using our live chat service on our website, in addition to calling us or making a face-to-face appointment, while our emergency repair service runs 24 hours a day, every day of the year.”

After leaving 5 Pancras Square, Ms Nkomo said she was looking forward to celebrating her protest with friends at the Mecca bingo in Camden Town.