Family feuds are never fun. But they happen and sometimes there’s just no resolving them.
But to cut off the power to your mother’s part of the house, which she owns, while she’s away on vacation seems just a wee bit petty. Especially since it’s fall and winter is coming.
This is what Sue Martin, 42, did to her 60-year old mother Catherine Beesley. So Beesley and her husband, Robert, are protesting on the roof of their house in Dorset, England. As neighbors walk by the Beesleys wave their handwritten bristol board signs declaring, “Paid for it, own it, denied it” and “Daughter denies mother electric.”
How did it get to this? According to Beesley, it was after she sold her daughter part of the 300,000pound ($485,000), 4 bedroom house they now co-own.
“This all started a few years ago after I sold two thirds of my bungalow to Sue and her former partner. It was fine for a while, I babysat the children and we all got on very well,” she told media. “But we had a falling out a couple of years ago and I haven’t spoken to Sue for months. It has broken my heart.”
Beesley says before her and her husband left on holiday they left her daughter a check to cover her part of the electricity. Her daughter, Sue Martin, says she didn’t;
“I inquired through her solicitor about how they planned to pay the bills,” Martin told media. “I heard nothing back from the lawyer, so the day before they came back I got an electrician to stop the power supply to the attic.I can’t afford to pay for them and for my family and I would have reactivated it as soon as I heard from her solicitor, which I didn’t. We haven’t spoken in such a long time it wasn’t the case that we could have resolved it face to face.”
Martin does admit her mom gave her money to cover the water bill before she left which was much more than what was needed.
“She gave me £120 to cover the water bill but I wasn’t going to cash it in as I only need 30.”she said in an interview with The Telegraph. (ummm… don’t ya think that maybe the other 90 quid might have been for the electricity bill there friend?)
Whatever the reason, the Beesleys have no electricity which has made things hard.
“It is so cold in the loft that we have to wear coats all the time and have no hot water at all.” Beesly said, “For food we rely on instant soup that my neighbor helps me make by giving me flasks of hot water, or sometimes we use a portable gas stove.”
And is Mr. Beesley a part of the whole domestic dispute? It kind of seems not:
“I think the whole situation is incredibly silly and I can’t believe it has come to this. I can’t see why we just can’t all live in peace.” [ Source ]
