Meet the volunteer heroes repairing broken electrical goods for free!

Steve Horton’s eyes are resolutely fixed on a wire sticking out of an old record player. The 66-year-old has been poking with his trusty screwdriver in the HMV record player from the 60s for more than two hours.

Finally, he smiles triumphantly. ‘Let’s see if it works!’ he explains.

The large wooden hut where he works is buzzing with activity. Volunteers, usually of retirement age, grapple with an array of broken items in hopes of giving them a new lease of life.

One is holding an antique lamp with faulty wiring; another handles a VHF radio that won’t turn on; and a third beavers away on a tricky cassette player.

And despite the threatening skies this autumn morning in Market Harborough, ten customers are already lining up outside to hear if the volunteers can use their magic and save their precious household items that were destined for the landfill.

Meet the Market Harborough Fixers – a group of 20 regular volunteers, mostly over 65s, who meet every Saturday morning on the edge of this medieval Leicestershire town.

Their repair cafe is similar to the BBC television program The Repair Shop, in which the King recently joined Jay Blades and the team with a piece of pottery made for Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee and an 18th century clock in need of some attention. .

The Market Harborough Fixers aim to fix ten items a week – mostly electrical and mechanical goods, computers, sewing equipment and jewelry – that would otherwise have ended up in landfills.

The service is free, except for the cost of new parts and any donations customers may wish to make.

The café’s rising popularity reflects a growing ‘make-do-and-mend’ mentality that is sweeping the country as the cost of living rises.

The average person in Britain throws away about 400 kg of waste every year. But according to management consultants Deloitte, half of us have repaired an item instead of replacing it in the past 12 months; and two in five also bought second-hand or refurbished items rather than buying new ones.

The government introduced new ‘right to repair’ rules last year, requiring companies to provide spare parts even after the warranty has expired, so that broken devices can be repaired.

The Market Harborough Fixers group was founded three years ago by chemistry consultant Steve Cousens, 69.

“I love doing it – it’s a break from my day job and I enjoy using my skills and reviving items,” Steve says. Fix it, save waste, save money and save the planet. That’s our motto.’

After a surge in popularity, Steve enlisted office worker Roseanne Steedman, 65, to help run the group, which has a Facebook page. Other volunteers include husband and wife David and Jackie Moore, both 67.

The group has proved to be a huge hit with the locals. Matt Irons, 73, whose broken record player was being worked on by repairman Steve Horton, says: “My 15-year-old grandson, Charlie, decided he wanted to play some vinyl records, and we had this old broken record player in the loft for 20 years.”

The vinyl player was a 21st birthday present for Matt’s wife Diane from her parents, but it didn’t work and he had no idea how to fix it.

Matt says, “We wanted to throw it away, but my wife is very sentimental and didn’t want to lose it. She’ll be thrilled, and Charlie will love it, too.’

Steve Horton saved Matt and his wife by buying their grandson a new record player, which would have cost at least £50.

To celebrate, Steve plays the opening bars of Olivia Newton-John’s Hopelessly Devoted To You — a vinyl he often uses to test his repair work.

Items brought to the Fixers come in all shapes and sizes.

The day Money Mail came along, a Russell Hobbs kettle with a broken heating element was repaired, along with a cassette player and a lamp.

Even local MP Neil O’Brien brought in his three-year-old son’s favorite red Roberts radio for repair.

Most visitors contact the group through its Facebook page. The Market Harborough hub is part of a network of around 250 ‘repair cafes’ across the UK, involving thousands of volunteers.

The team has been able to repair 115 items since May, including 92 electrical products.

Founder Steve Cousens says it has so far prevented 433kg of waste from going to landfill.

Among those items was a Janome sewing machine brought in by Clare Gassman.

The pregnant mother of one saved the machine from Freecycle – a recycling website where people often offer free items to help clean up their homes.

She picked it up for the Ukrainian woman who has been staying with her family since September after fleeing Putin’s invasion of her homeland.

The woman, who has two young daughters, had her own clothing business in Ukraine.

However, she couldn’t take her clunky sewing machine to Britain.

Clare says, “I saw someone else in the group brought in a broken sewing machine and it was being repaired, so I thought I’d do the same. We hope she can use this machine and work again.”

The machine has been repaired after a piece of wire that jammed in the foot was removed.

A new Janome machine can cost as much as £850, but getting it fixed at the repair cafe will cost Clare less than a pound.

All objects are reviewed by volunteers before being accepted. Customers must sign a waiver of liability in the event damage occurs to the item while it is being repaired.

The group operates on a donation basis, but customers must cover the cost of all parts needed during the repair.

Roseanne Steedman, who helps run the group, added: ‘We are passionate about waste and recycling, so hopefully the Fixers will help stop filling the landfill with broken items that can be repaired, while helping people save money.’

a.cooke@dailymail.co.uk