A DISABLED couple are appealing to Guy Fawkes revellers to be careful about where they stage bonfires next year after debris left them virtual prisoners in their own home for 36 hours.

Pensioners Elsie and William King, who both have difficulty walking and are heavily dependent on their car for transport, were horrified when debris from a bonfire held at the back of their house in Rushey Fold Lane blocked their car from getting out of a back street.

They had to wait 36 hours before the rubbish was finally cleared out of the way by the organisers.

Elsie, aged 74, a retired textile worker said: "There was so much rubbish that we couldn't even drive over it. There were so many cans of lager and bottles of beer about that if we had driven down the back street we wouldn't have had any tyres left.

"I've not been able to go out and do my shopping."

She is now calling on bonfire organisers to think what effect bonfires could have on nearby residents.

Elsie said: "If there had been an emergency I don't know what we would have done. I'm not a kill-joy. Life's not a rehearsal and you've got to enjoy it, but I wish people would think about the effect their bonfire could have on neighbours."

A Bolton Council spokesman said a council officer had visited the bonfire organisers and requested that they cleared away the rubbish, which the organisers then did.