Eighty-one-year-old Margaret McCreadie was left ‘worried sick’ that enforcement action would be taken against her because her 70ft long hilly garden had grown out of control.

After reading about her plight in the Telegraph last week, big-hearted prison officer Mark Thomson decided he had to do something to help.

He said: “When I read Margaret’s story in the Tele, I thought it was a shame and wanted to do something to help.

“I went straight round to her door and said I could do it myself or gather a group of prison officers together to come down and help as it would be a good deed for the community.

“The prison governor Willie Stuart was very supportive of the idea and was more than happy for us to hire a van and use the jail’s gardening equipment as it’s a big job.

“We’re going to cut the garden right back to the bare bones so that Margaret doesn’t have to worry about it for a long time.” Margaret says the Gateside jail staff’s kindness has restored her faith in humanity.

She smiled: “It’s very good of them.

“Mark was the first person to contact me to offer help.

“I’m very grateful.

“A lot of people contacted me to offer their assistance, which was lovely.

“I also want to thank the young boy who came down and worked hard on the garden.” The Tele reported last week how Margaret was left worried sick when someone reported her to Inverclyde Council regarding the state of her garden.

The local authority’s head of environmental and commercial services wrote to her saying that it had been brought to his attention that vegetation at the front of the property was overhanging the public footway.

The letter left Margaret fearing she could end up in trouble.

Housing association River Clyde Homes insisted it couldn’t help Margaret to maintain her garden in Greenock’s Rankin Street because she owns her home and is solely responsible for it.

Margaret says she is hugely relieved that the problem has been taken care of.

She said: “It’s impossible for me to do the garden myself, and it would cost me a fortune to get people in to do it for me.”