News

Lots of issues within the fire safety industry currently with fires involving wooden balconies, cladding and an ever increasing risk of external fire spread. This needs to be taken into account within a fire risk assessment and consideration given to how a fire that starts internally could potentially spread to the outside of the building and what impacts that may have on your evacuation plans and other fire precautions.

I do wonder whether money could be better spent than on a waking watch.

Landlords and residents are spending a fortune on these but are there examples where these have worked and sped up an evacuation?  Perhaps there are, let me know if you have heard of one.  I would prefer a heat detector installed in each flat linked to a central system which sounds a full evacuation throughout the building.  Just one idea but the problem with waking watches is they can go on for such a long time, costing a fortune, creating their own risks where you could have sorted it very quickly for less money in the long run.

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This is an interesting article on Inside Housing as it talks about Housing Associations running out of money and the costly and logistical problems leaseholders and residents are facing. Some residents cannot sell their flats, mortgage companies are not lending, residents are struggling to find consultants to confirm their building satisfies advice note 14. Loads of government advice notes confusing the issues even more. But it’s a good read and ends with a good potential solution of consolidating all the advice notes into one. I feel for the tenants and residents as through no fault of their own they are in no mans land.

I think this is the tip of the iceberg. How many more buildings have inadequate fire safety measures than we know about? Cladding has obviously been a major issue and talking point but what’s next to go wrong that we don’t know about? It often takes a horrible disaster to learn lessons but what can we try and learn now and put right now to stop that from happening? Certainly risk assessing every building on its merit is a start. So is putting residents safety and the right evacuation plan in place. Sometimes we have to be willing to challenge accepted norms and guidance. I think we need to be open minded about the future of fire safety in the UK.

Good to see any impartial guidance come out for fire safety. This time for landlords. Please contact us if you need a fire risk assessment for your block of flats, HMO or commercial building we can help.

Any landlord not taking fire safety seriously may want to read this. All you need to do to get started is have a suitable and sufficient fire risk assessment completed. Ignorance is no defence in court and you are putting your residents and yourself at massive risk if you don’t have the right fire precautions in your HMO or other type of residential property