Father of boy killed by mould in flat urges tenants with similar issue to leave

The father of Awaab Ishak, the two-year-old who died because of mould in a social housing flat, has pleaded with tenants to “waste no time” in complaining and to simply “get out” if they find themselves exposed to similar problems.

- Robert Booth

Speaking in his first national newspaper interview since Awaab died, aged two, in December 2020 as a result of untreated mould in their one-bedroom social housing flat in Rochdale, Faisal Abdullah, 31, also called on the government to introduce strict deadlines for landlords to tackle mould in the private rented sector as well as in social housing – an extension of the so-called Awaab’s law, which is due to come into effect for social housing.

“I can’t emphasise enough, for those tenants who find themselves in similar situations, not to waste time,” he said through a translator. “Please, please, please … make sure you knock at the right doors,” he said in an interview in Manchester.

“Even if it means getting out of the accommodation, please do so, because if you’ve got children and it takes longer to find a remedy that will be at the expense of the health of the children or you as an adult.”

Asked if he wished his family had got out, he said: “Absolutely.” Growing up in the arid Sudanese region of Darfur, he was unfamiliar with mould and damp, he said. When Awaab became ill he wasn’t certain whether it was the mould causing it.

Awaab would have turned five next month, but died after living his whole life alongside extensive black mould in the kitchen, bathroom and bedroom of the family’s poorly ventilated home on the Freehold estate run by Rochdale Boroughwide Housing (RBH), a social housing landlord.