A rented home in Mansfield was found to have serious health and safety hazards, including a leaking roof and a lack of smoke detectors, a court has been told.

In a case brought before Mansfield Magistrates by the town’s council, landlord Fiona Needham was convicted under the Housing Act 2004. 

She had previously pleaded not guilty to the allegation and was due to be tried on the matter, but changed her plea to guilty. 

She was fined £1,060 and ordered to pay a victim surcharge of £100 and full prosecution costs of £1,551.85. 

The court was told the landlord had failed to comply with an improvement notice issued by the council, whose officers inspected the property after receiving a complaint of disrepair in April last year. 

They found serious hazards that would affect the health and safety of the tenant, her young child and any visitors. 

These included inadequate fire detection systems, an insufficient number of (and faulty) power sockets, a risk of falling due to lack of light switches, a boiler that was not heating the property sufficiently, damp and mould where the roof was leaking, and escape windows on the first floor without appropriate safety catches. 

There were informal attempts to persuade Needham to carry out improvements but no work was done so officers served an improvement notice in June 2018. 

They revisited the property and found that while the roof had been replaced and the electrical system checked, the smoke alarms were not connected. 

The magistrates heard that a significant fire safety risk remained at the property and that the council was considering carrying out the works needed and recharging Needham.

In mitigation, Needham’s solicitor told the court that his client accepted she had not done enough to get the work done, but said that tradesmen had not always been allowed in to the property.