A DISABLED woman has been left stranded after vandals slashed the tyres of the car she calls her lifeline to the outside world.

Eileen Holt has trouble walking and uses a mobility scooter to get around. The 62-year-old has recently had a disabled parking bay put outside her home in Gordon Avenue in Springhill, so that she can have easy access to her car.

But shortly after the bay was put in, Mrs Holt, a widow, discovered that two tyres on her Ford Mondeo had been slashed four times, leaving her unable to leave her home.

She said: "I have had my wing mirror broken several times by cars making a tight turn and that is bad enough to repair but when my tyres were slashed I had no way of taking the car to the garage myself. I had to call to have it towed there. Without my car I am housebound."

Mrs Holt, who sits on a disability panel for Lancashire County Council, was unable to go out to do her shopping or keep vital appointments while she waited for her car to be fixed.

She said: "It makes me sick. My car is my life line. They couldn't mend the tyres, they had to be completely replaced."

Mrs Holt can find no motivation for the callous attack on her car and believes the location of her property at the end of the street made her vehicle an easy target for the vandals - despite it being parked in a disabled bay.

She said that it makes it even worse because it comes so soon after having the disabled parking bay installed outside her home.

She added: "The gentleman on the next road, who also lives on the end house, had his tyres let down the same night.

"I wish they had only let mine down - that would have been less expensive."

Insp Chris Saville confirmed that the incident is being investigated by police.