Landlady fined for allowing smoking inside her Rugeley pub

CCTV showed Amanda Frisby smoking in the pub

A landlady caught smoking inside her pub along with several customers has been fined.

Police were checking CCTV as part of an unrelated investigation and saw Amanda Frisby and others smoking inside The Cabin, Rugeley, outside opening hours.

She later admitted in an interview with police and Cannock Chase Council's Environmental Health team to smoking and permitting others to in April.

She was ordered to pay £766 with five others given fixed penalty notices.

The smoking, an offence under the Health Act 2006, happened in the early hours of 23 April and three fixed penalty notices were issued in May, one in June and a final one in July, the council said.

'Must be held accountable'

Frisby was fined £440, ordered to pay costs of £150 and a victim surcharge £176 through a single justice prosecution, which is used for minor criminal offences where the case can be decided by a magistrate without going to court.

Cannock Chase councillor Andrea Muckley, leader of the Green group and environment and climate change portfolio leader, said this was the first case of this nature she and officers had encountered, adding it was "extremely rare".

The smoking happened in the pub in April the council said

"I think if it was happening in any place that you're home, then that's obviously very different, but a pub is a place of business and therefore it is controlled under these laws that prevent smoking," she told BBC Radio WM.

"So it is the law, publicans know the law. They know they can't smoke within the public area and neither can their patrons and I think everybody seems to know that... that's why we don't get much of this coming through.

"I don't think it's too extreme [to prosecute]. I don't think it's too harsh. It is the law and we all must be held accountable by the same law."

She said the smoking law had been in place for many years with a ban on smoking in cars introduced in 2015, and accepted that while people "don't want a nanny state", people's health was important.