A FAMILY-RUN restaurant is prepared to spend £10,000 to settle a row over “eye-watering” smoke neighbours claim is making their lives a misery.

Elderly residents in Ullswater Court, South Woodford, have been battling for four years to get rid of “thick, fishy, acrid” smoke they claim billows into their homes from Wood Oven in George Lane most evenings.

The group of 30 85 to 94-year-olds say they have submitted written, photo, and video evidence of the nuisance, but Redbridge Council says there is not enough to justify an environmental health risk.

But despite Redbridge taking the restaurant’s side, manager Sevim Has says the business is prepared to do “whatever it takes” to rectify the situation.

After meeting with residents last Friday (August 4), she said: “In the 10 years the restaurant has been here, we’ve never had a problem like this before.

“But we’re a family business and we want to treat everyone like they were family.

“I completely understand where these people are coming from, a lot of them are elderly, and they should be relaxing in their garden, not wasting their energy complaining about this.

“We will do our absolute best and do whatever we can to help them.”

Ms Has says council officers have been to visit the restaurant on several occasions to check the grill, ventilation, and smoke alarm systems and have found no issues.

She also claims she has never had any complaints from the flats directly above the premises and has never actually seen the smoke at Ullswater Court herself.

She said: “The council says everything is okay, and we’ve got all the right paperwork, so we could just be doing nothing.

“But a lot of the residents have health problems, and the whole thing has been very upsetting for us, so we’re going to do whatever it takes.”

Wood Oven is going to apply for planning permission to extend its chimney by one or two metres in the hope smoke will no longer float in the direction of the block.

Despite an estimated cost of at least £10,000, the owners are also going to start cleaning their ventilation system every three months – twice more often than the law requires.

Ms Has added: “Unfortunately if we don’t get permission to extend the chimney, we can only do what we’re doing already – we can’t change the way the wind blows and we can’t shut the barbecue, because if we do that, we won’t have a business.”

Ullswater resident spokesman Vincent O’Brian said Ms Has was “very amenable” when she visited his neighbours last week.

But the 80-year-old widower said: “I’m sorry the restaurant is having to do so much to sort this out, but we have the right to smoke-free air.

“At the end of the day, there shouldn’t be any smoke at all.

“Maybe if the council was more firm with them, this whole thing would have been dealt with sooner.”

His neighbour Fred Gray, 89, says he has to close all his windows and doors because the smell of the smoke is so bad, and Peter Bean, 90, claims it meant he had to cancel his recent anniversary garden party.

A Redbridge Council spokesman said: "The Environmental Protection Act 1990 states that any alleged nuisance needs to be witnessed and evaluated by an Environmental Health Officer."