EIGHT families are demanding action to prevent dirty water flooding their cellars after claiming it has happened 16 times in four years.

The neighbours, in a row of terraced houses in the Earcroft area of Blackburn Road, Darwen, said they were fed up waiting for the problem to be solved.

In 1999, United Utilities admitted that a sewer at Hollins Road and Hawkshaw Avenue had four faults which meant it could not cope with heavy rainfall.

The cellars are flooded to a depth of 4ft when there is heavy rain, the most recent being during the flash floods on June 14.

But United Utilities blame the renewed flooding on high levels of water in the area which can no longer filter away through the sewer since the broken pipes were fixed.

And therefore they say the "long and complicated issue" of the continued flooding is now the responsibility of the householders.

All the residents have a pump operating 24 hours a day in their cellars to clear out small amounts of dirty water -- even when it is not raining.

They said the smell was disgusting and made their homes a nightmare to live in. Some claim they are unable to get insurance.

All said there was was never a problem with flooding until work was done on a faulty sewer in October, 1998. They are now seeking legal advice.

Derek Roberts, 54, who has lived on Blackburn Road for 14 years, said: "My cellar used to be a workshop but I can't use it now.

"We get a lot of slugs and the smell is terrible. It gets through the whole of the house -- that's definitely the worst thing. We haven't been able to invite guests because it is so bad."

Pauline Clark, 47, who has lived there for six years, said: "We have no confidence in United Utilities. We have allowed them to try and solve it for three and a half years and it's not acceptable. My property is now valueless and I feel like crying each time my mortgage is paid."

Frank Brunt, 50, said: "We just want the job doing right. We are not asking for anything extraordinary. We have had enough."

Bill Tait, 55, said his cellar had been sealed off by United Utilities earlier this year with concrete to make it water tight. But on June 14 it was flooded with four feet of water.

A spokesperson for United Utilities said: "We carried out work to isolate the cellars from the sewer and to re-line the sewer in the road, so it is most likely that this is natural groundwater getting into the cellar. This is a common problem with cellars and not our responsibility.

"When the isolation work was done we noticed that the ground beneath the cellars was very sandy and wet, which would indicate that there is a high water table in the area."