A south London mum has been forced to commute three hours every day, after a local council placed her in a temporary flat over an hour away from her daughter’s school. 

Fatmata Kalokoh-Larkoh was moved to a flat in Crystal Palace with her daughter last August.

Since moving to the area, Ms Kalokoh-Larkoh said her nine-year-old daughter has never been on time for school in Plumstead, Greenwich.

 She said: “We wake up at five for her. It takes one hour for her to actually start waking up because she’s tired and still wants to sleep.

"Where we used to live, she woke up at eight o’clock because it wasn’t far from the school.”

The mother said that the lack of sleep from commuting so far is impacting her daughter’s education.

She said: “When she goes to school, she’s still sleeping. She sleeps in the classroom.”

Ms Kalokoh-Larkoh said she is also waiting for Greenwich Council to arrange transport for her daughter to get to school, but they have not confirmed who will be the driver for her area.

Suffering from chronic pain, the mother added that sometimes she can’t take her child to school at all.

Ms Kalokoh-Larkoh said: “If it’s too much for me, I don’t come. I just stay in Crystal Palace because the pain is too much.

"Because I have to take a lot of medication for me to be able to drop down.”

The mother said she has suffered from pain after the ceiling in her first property in Plumstead fell down on her, allegedly after Greenwich Council installed a new sink in the flat above.

 She said: “The wall just fell on my back. I was sitting down to use the bathroom. [My daughter] just finished in the bathroom and I went in.

"And when she left within one minute, that’s when it happened.”

Since the ceiling fell down, Ms Kalokoh-Larkoh said she has been unable to work and found it tough to walk.

She said: “Sometimes I feel numb.

"Right now, I feel nothing in my leg. Sometimes I feel numb in my hands. I’m not feeling anything, I think it’s because of the thing that happened.”

The mother said she was evicted from her council flat in Plumstead last July after not being able to keep up with payments.

She said the council moved her to temporary accomodation in three other areas over the summer before being placed in Crystal Palace. 

A Greenwich Council spokesperson said that Ms Kalokoh-Larkoh was in temporary accommodation after making herself “intentionally homeless” and that she refused attempts to help her.

They added that there are currently 1,700 households in temporary accommodation, and over 26,000 households on the council’s waiting list for housing.

The spokesperson said: “After decades of disastrous housing policies by successive governments there is simply not enough suitable accommodation in our borough, and this means sometimes we are forced to house residents further away than they would like.  

“Every child matters to us, no matter the attitude of the parent, and we have arranged transport to school for Ms Kalokoh-Larkoh’s daughter so she can remain at her existing school. 

"We would urge any council residents who are having troubles with their tenancy to get in touch with us sooner, rather than later, so we can see what we can do to help them.”

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