A report by Peter Williams
' We Made a Technical Mistake ... Up and down the country, hundreds of thousands of people are living in rooms that look filthy; but the black walls aren't dirty, they're alive with mould. And, for much of the year, they are wet.
Condensation in modern council homes is a problem of mammoth proportions. The councils usually blame the tenants; they say it's all due to the way the people live. But now, its becoming clear that the main fault lies at the designers' door. They overlooked simple schoolboy physics - that when warm moist air hits a cold surface, water is produced.
Open Secret visits Manchester, where the bill to put things right on one estate will be well over a million pounds; and a small town in Wales, where a quarter of all their council houses are being demolished because of condensation, only 12 years after they were built.
PETER WILLIAMS asks architects, Government advisors and council officials: How did we get into this mess? '
Researcher VALERIE KAYE Film editor JOHN STOTHART Producer ALAN DOESON