A PENSIONER jailed for refusing to pay her council tax in protest at the state of her street says conditions are still so bad she is quitting the UK.

Josephine Rooney is going to move to Ireland because she is terrified of living in Hartington Street, Derby.

The 75-year-old was jailed twice, in 2006 and 2008, because she withheld her council tax in anger at Derby City Council not improving the area.

But despite her protest and assurances from the council, she has counted 40 needles currently littering her back garden – and said she was living in fear of drunks, drug-takers and vandals.

She said: "I've reached a point of acceptance that it's never going to get better and I need to leave it behind.

"I find living on the street very menacing – it is driving me out of my own home."

Miss Rooney, who now pays her council tax in full, has boarded up her ground-floor windows to stop people from breaking in.

She said that two weeks ago, a drunk man was standing in front of her front door and wouldn't let her in.

She said: "I want something to be done but I won't be taking the stance that I took before. That is all behind me. I am a 75-year-old pensioner now so I can't do that any more.

"The street is not going to change. Some of the owners of the properties don't care who their tenants are.

"There are some good landlords in Hartington Street who do care but it is affecting their business."

Miss Rooney's council tax protest hit the headlines in the Derby Telegraph and the national media in 2006.

She argued that she did not get good value for the money claimed each year by the city council and said there was no evidence of an area improvement scheme the authority had said it was going to carry out.

She was jailed twice – for three months in 2006, serving just 24 hours of her sentence after a mystery benefactor paid her bill, and for 28 days in 2008.

At the time, she owed £1,476, which Derby City Council eventually wrote off.

After her release from prison, Miss Rooney said the street improved slightly – but in the last couple of years it has gone downhill again.

She said: "Visually, it did improve for a while but now you can see the deterioration in the way it looks and the people who live there.

"There are some good people in Hartington Street – but it is only a small percentage."

Heroin-users throw used needles into Miss Rooney's garden from the alleyway behind, where they congregate. It was dubbed "smack alley'' in a national newspaper report during Miss Rooney's previous protest.

She said: "I did tell them to stop throwing things into my garden because I am a pensioner and I do not like it.

"Some seemed sorry but others didn't.

"The drugs are the worst, but then alcohol is bad as well.

"People behave more obnoxious when they are drunk. A couple of weeks ago, I walked down to Marks and Spencer to buy some food and when I got home, there was this drunk man standing in front of my door.

"He wouldn't let me in. One of my good neighbours came out and told him quite firmly to go away but it was terrifying. People who saw him said that he was trying to break in."

Another time, Miss Rooney said a group of people in the alley behind her garden set fire to some furniture.

"I was asleep upstairs at the time but the smoke alarms were going off, which woke me up, and I could see smoke in the hallway," she said.

"So I went downstairs and when I opened the back door there was a wall of fire. I went into shock. It left me petrified for a long time afterwards."

Miss Rooney bought her three-storey house in 1985.

"Since then, the situation has got very bad," she said.

"When I first moved to Hartington Street, there was not a drugs problem.

"But it went downhill very quickly. I was away for about five years in the 1990s and when I came back I was shocked at the amount of drugs and squatters.

"There are landlords who will let anybody in. They just don't care. The landlords and the council have got to work together to sort the problems out."

Miss Rooney said that while she still spends time in the UK, she is looking at a permanent move to Ireland, where she was born and where her brother lives.

She said that if Hartington Street was a nice place to live, then she would not have considered the move.

"I just accept that I did my best and that I failed," she said.

"I've learnt that there's more to life than Derby City Council. Now I'm taking more interest in Ireland and want to spend more time there.

"All I can do is pray that the situation in Hartington Street improves one day."

Ian Wheatley, head of grounds maintenance at Derby City Council, said: "Our street cleansing teams carry out cleaning work in alleyways around Hartington Street but this service does not extend to people's private gardens.

"Residents can report any needles found on council land to Streetpride by calling 0333 200 6981."

Hartington Street timeline

2002: Hartington Street is designated a Renewal Area and nearly £2.9 million is allocated to it as part of a 10-year programme to regenerate the road and streets around it.

2005: Josephine Rooney refuses to pay her Derby City Council tax because she says the street is a haunt for drug-users and the council has failed to take action.

May 2006: Miss Rooney is told she faces a three-month jail sentence for refusing to pay her council tax.

June 5, 2006: Derby City Council workers find and clear more than 1,000 needles from in and around Hartington Street.

June 26, 2006: Miss Rooney is jailed for three months for refusing to pay her council tax.

June 27, 2006: Miss Rooney is released from jail after a well-wisher pays her outstanding council tax bill.

August 2006: A £60,000 programme of work to improve properties in Hartington Street and clear out overgrown areas of rubbish gets under way.

January 2007: Miss Rooney appears at Southern Derbyshire Magistrates' Court and accepts liability for failing to pay her 2006-07 council tax. In the same month, the council says that since 2002, a total of £809,000 has been spent improving the area.

July 23, 2007: Miss Rooney appears in court again, where she admits liability for failing to pay her 2007-08 council tax.

April 2008: Miss Rooney is jailed for 28 days for failing to pay her £1,476.17 bill. The council writes off the debt saying the money cannot be recovered.