Allotment waiting lists on the Phipps Bridge estate have caused outcry from locals eager to put their green fingers into practice.

While authorities are urging families to grow their own fruit and vegetables to help keep food costs down during the recession, one Mitcham resident is furious at the council’s seeming lack of interest in its own allotments.

After working on a plot of land at the Phipps Bridge site as a volunteer for Disabled Merton, John White, 54, decided to join the waiting list for an allotment of his own last November.

Mr White, of Haydon Park Road, is frustrated that while there is a lengthy wait, there are various vacant and abandoned plots left to become overgrown.

He said: “It’s a mystery as to why there is such a big queue for an allotment, yet when you go down to Phipps Bridge there are plots which have clearly not been used for years.

“The brambles are eight feet tall and there are old TVs dumped in one corner.”

Waiting times for allotments in Merton range from six months to 10 years, with Phipps Bridge taking an estimated nine to 12 months.

Merton Council cabinet member for environment and leisure services Councillor David Simpson said the council had issued 188 notices in the last nine months to people who haven't maintained their sites to make room for those desperate for allotment space.

However Mr White said the council does not seem to consider the allotments an important issue.

“I’ve called up the council several times, but I get a different story every time. I’m told that someone will ring be back, but they never do, and the people you need to speak to seem to always be unavailable,” he said.

“There is a lot of interest in getting people to grow their own food now. It really seems to be flavour of the month, which makes it even more annoying that you can’t get an allotment.”

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