Horrified families living in the Foundry Court flats in Mill Street, Slough have been without water for three days - unable even to wash their hands as the spread of the Coronavirus makes hygiene vitally important.

Resident Antony Quarrell, 43, lives in one of the 162 flats with his wife and nine month old baby.

He discovered the water was off early Friday morning.

It is understood water supplies were cut off after pumps supplying the flats failed when a burst water pipe flooded the pumping chamber.

A furious Mr Quarrell said a visit on Friday by two engineers from the property management company Hazelvine Limited offered little hope of relief.

He said: "We were told the parts required for to fix the damage could not be sourced until after the weekend, meaning we faced days without water.

"Residents were left in the dark regarding the incident, as there was no proactive communication from either housing association A2 Dominion or property management Hazelvine Limited, who are responsible for the flats water supply system."

Mr Quarrell said families had to glean what information they could from either speaking to the two engineers on site or by calling A2 Dominion and Hazelvine Limited to plead for assistance and answers. No one has been seen on site working to resolve the incident since Friday.

He said callers were told by Hazelvine Limited to buy five litre bottles of water from Tesco with an instruction from Managing Director Nigel Burnand stipulating that they could only buy claim back the cost of five litres of water per day from the company – the amount of water typically used to flush the average toilet just once.

Mr Quarrell said: "With no agency taking any responsibility for emergency provision, residents, many of whom have young families, have found themselves having to make regular trips to shops to buy large amounts of water.

"Without running water, routine essential daily tasks such as cooking, washing-up, bathing and doing the laundry have proved difficult if not impossible.

"Some residents have been left out of pocket, after booking themselves into hotels simply so they can have access to running water and toilets.

"There is concern at mounting bills for buying bottled water and hot meals with Hazlevine, so far refusing to confirm they will provide any remuneration other than for bottled water."

He added: “The guy in charge of Hazlevine needs a serious reality check if he thinks five litres of water is enough to meet the daily needs of one resident.

“The average flush of a toilet alone uses up that – it just shows how out of touch he is and what little thought has been given to the welfare of residents and planning for incidents like this.

“What with us all being reminded of the importance of hygiene amid the corona virus threat I would have expected daily deliveries of large amounts of water and hand sanitiser to each flat as a bare minimum along with the offer of alteranative accommodation in hotels until they get this fixed.”

Slough Observer:

Residents are now demanding that Hazelvine and A2 Dominion reimburse all costs, including hotel bills, incurred as a result of the incident, and also provide compensation for the disruption caused.

A reply to Mr Quarrell from Mr Burnand over the weekend said: "If we can prove it was a burst water main then it might be possible to make a claim through the Thames Water's insurance but this has still to be established. The building insurance does not cover this."

The company said on social media yesterday that deliveries of bottled water would be made - but Mr Quarrell says he believes only some blocks received any and no-one he had spoken to did.