A housing association has apologised for dismissing a mother's fears about a broken step as 'not an emergency' - before a child was injured on them.
Nicole Craft said she called her landlords Home Group on April 12 to ask that a faulty metal staircase at the back of her home in Teams, Gateshead, be fixed, as she was scared someone might get hurt. But staff ruled the repair wasn't urgent and set a date nearly two weeks in the future by which they said it would be completed.
But just three days later she said one of the steps broke under a five-year-old girl, causing her to fall through the staircase and leaving her scraped and bruised. Fearing serious injury, Nicole took her to A&E at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital, in Gateshead.
