rro - order or chaos

FSE 15www. f s e o n l i n e . c o . u k

REGULATION AND ENFORCEMENT

safety companies and the myriad ofother job titles that earn a living in thissector. I am also including theubiquitous safety officers who now findthemselves involved in the fire safetyprocess.

Clearly we all have an important rolein making our buildings safer from fireand protecting those who occupy them,so we need to be more open, honestand more transparent in our dealings.

are the penhallow, atherstone onStour and Royal Marsden firesindicative of how fire safety is headingin the future or just a minor set back?Have we just been unlucky or is thissymptomatic of something far moreserious in how we manage fire safety inthe UK? All of these incidents havebrought the subject of fire safety intothe spotlight recently for one reason oranother and while it is too early to gointo the causes, I believe the time isright to question how we all address theproblem.

It would be nice to think these firesthat that we have recently experiencedin very diverse occupancies are just aminor setback. But I feel that this maynot be the case and I will be focusing on

RRO - ORDER OR CHAOS?

The devastation caused by the fire at the Penhallow Hotel in Newquay

hotel fire safety later in this article toillustrate the point, because I believe itis a good indicator of how we managefire safety overall.

While it is very easy to blame othersfor these failings, I think that we firsthave to look closer to home. In myexperience, we are not very goodambassadors for our own profession,and I include under this heading localauthority fire officers, consultants, fire

With several high profile fatal fires last year, questions are being asked about the

effectiveness of the Regulatory Reform Act. Here, Alan Cox, who last autumn featured

in a BBC undercover investigation into fire safety in hotels, says a stronger direction

from government and transparency in enforcement is needed to minimise the chances

of further disasters.

“I have direct experience of investigatingfires where the official reports did notnecessarily tally with what I found out wasactually the case on the ground”

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the most dangerous that I have seen fora long time. Needless to say they didnot get the contract.

It is perhaps very easy to blame thesecompanies for situations like this. But ifthere is a lack of control and guidancefrom central government, they are goingto take opportunities when they arise.

In another example, I recently visitedan event at a venue which previouslyhad a fire. Even there, I witnessedobstructed fire exits and self-closingdoors, fire doors wedged open andelectric cables trailed under fire doors.The management of the venue shouldhave known better!

Serious hotel fires

We all stay in hotels at some point inour lives. But do we ever bother topractice what we preach? When we stayin a hotel and notice a fire door wedgedopen or an obstructed fire exit, do wecomplain to the manager or do we justpass by and think that someone else willput it right?

Until the Penhallow fire last year, theUK had not had a serious hotel fire inrecent years but around the world, thesituation is different, as you can seefrom the table. Have we been lucky inthe UK or was our approach better thansome of these other countries?

Unfortunately, there is no simpleanswer to this difficult questionbecause if you look at our prescriptivelegislation that existed for many years,there were good and bad points. If weuse statistics as a measure we can fairlyconfidently say that this approachachieved the desired result. So whychange something that wasn’t broken,and will the risk assessment approachbe any better? There are nearly as many

I have direct experience ofinvestigating fires where the officialreports did not necessarily tally withwhat I found out was actually the caseon the ground. I do believe that if weare to truly learn from these tragedies,our investigation and reportingprocedures need to be more open,independent and transparent. In theUSA, many serious fire investigationsare carried out by the National FireProtection Association and becausethey are independent from theenforcing authorities, they produceresults that are more credible. I havenever believed in the policeinvestigating their own mistakes, andmy experience certainly doesn’t favourthe fire service doing so with theirs.

Transparency needed

For some years I worked for a majorglobal financial institution and the waythat fire safety was managed was verypoor, even though they hadexperienced a fire with several deathsin one of their branches. It was notuncommon to find problems such as:● fire suppression systems that had not

been switched on foryears● sprinkler systems with no water● fire exits bricked up and fire doors

and walls removed● discharged fire suppression systems.When I raised these defects with thegroup fire and safety manager, I wastold that we couldn’t mentioned thembecause we would be shootingourselves in the foot, as one of our teamhad visited previously and it wasn’traised as an issue then. So in manyinstances things never improved, and inmany cases I was not even allowed tonotify the occupants of the problems.

It’s very easy to think that just because acompany employs their own fire andsafety staff that they are doing a goodjob. Unfortunately, however, just likeany other organisation there are strongpolitical pressures that can sometimesdictate the results.

Neither is the fire trade exempt fromcriticism. I was recently carrying out anundercover investigation into hotel firesafety for the BBC TV programmeInside Out, following the PenhallowHotel fire in Newquay. One of thehotels that I was due to stay in was thesubject of a conversation with someonefrom a local fire safety company, whoinformed me that their trade associationhad held their annual conference thereand it was a ‘death trap’. But if this wasthe case and they were aware of theproblems, why didn’t they dosomething about it?

A couple of years ago I visited a fairlylarge fire company to assess theircapability to provide fire extinguishermaintenance for a client with about2000 locations. I was welcomed by theMD who started to tell me all abouthow good their company was, how theyhad expanded into a new prestigiousHQ six months ago, and that businesswas now so good they were nowcarrying out fire risk assessments fortheir clients – even their sales managerwas doing them! When I asked to seethe fire risk assessment for their newbuilding, he looked very embarrassedand admitted that they hadn’t hadenough time to complete one. I thenlooked around the building and Idiscovered that it had no fire alarmsystem, one of the fire exits wasdeadlocked and no one could find thekey, and the paint spray area was one of

A smoke detector

‘bagged off’ (left)

and flammable

materials with an

open fire door

(above)

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An unprotected fire

escape passing a

kitchen (left) and a

blocked escape

route

routes● High risk areas opening onto escape

routes● Incorrect fire procedure.● Poorly maintained fire equipmentAs I did not receive a reply I forwardedmy concerns to the local fire authority,building control officer and the touristoffice. I only received one reply, fromthe fire authority, which said:

“As the fire service does not have anylegislation covering this type ofpremises I have passed your letter to thehealth and safety section of theCouncil’s Environment ServicesDepartment. If they are able to act onthis information they will respond toyou directly.”

I wrote back informing them thateven if they didn’t have any powers atthe present they soon would have – asa result of the impending RegulatoryReform (Fire Safety) Order) – and thatin any case they had a responsibility toinspect a property when someone hadinformed them that it was a threat tolife safety. As I did not get a reply I sentcopies of my letter to all the membersof the fire authority, which produced aninstant response they were sending

views on this as there are types of riskassessment so instead of gettinginvolved in a no-win situation, I willoutline some of my recent experiencesin hotels in the UK. This, I feel, will givean interesting overview of how thingsare working out in practice.

This first example is a hotel inHarrogate, where I stayed whileattending – of all things – a fire safetyexhibition in the town. As usual I had awalk around my hotel to check theescape routes and this is what I found:● numerous fire doors wedged open,

and/or damaged or not up to standard● fire doors removed● storage of combustible items on the

staircase and poor housekeeping● obstructed escape routes● poor fire exit signage● smoke detectors bagged offI wrote to the owner and pointed outthe problems but as I did not receive areply, I referred it to the fire authorityto investigate. I’m informed that theyvisited and prepared an ‘action plan’ ofremedial fire safety work. I wonder howmany other visitors from the fireprofession stayed here and ignoredthese serious problems?

The next hotel in Torquay was onethat I stayed in while carrying out theundercover investigation into hotel firesafety for the BBC programme I referredto earlier. My usual walk around the fireexits revealed the following:● fire escape door locked with no

means of opening● external fire escapes with serious

exposure risks (adjacent to kitchen)and corroded external fire escape

● escape routes through bedrooms withaccess by keys in glass fronted boxes

and obstructed exit routes● high risk areas on dead ends with no

fire doors● incorrect fire signage● fire doors not closing or ineffective

ones with no smoke or intumescentseals

As I felt there was a serious threat to lifehere, I notified the fire authority of theproblems. They carried out animmediate inspection and agreed anumber of improvements with theowner. They also found that staff areaswere not suitable for sleeping in andthese were taken out of use.

Following the broadcast of theprogramme in September last year,another fire consultant visited one ofthe Penhallow Hotel’s sisterestablishments and found that firedoors did not have fire and smoke seals.The fire authority visited and issued anenforcement notice. During the courseof the investigation I visited 14 three-star hotels, 13 of which were not up tothe required standards.

No escape?

The next is a set of self-cateringapartment which to all intents andpurposes is a hotel that goes by thedescription of holiday flats. I includethese premises, where I stayed in July2006, because it was one of the buildinguses that escaped the previouslegislation. Here are some of theproblems that I wrote to the ownerabout:● Virtually no horizontal or vertical fire

separation● Fire doors removed● No protected escape routes● Combustible furniture on escape

“A fire trade association had held its annual conference ata hotel that was described as a ‘death trap”

2005 15 people died and 50 injured in a hotel fire in Paris

2001 70 people died in a hotel the Philippines

2001 70 people died in a hotel the Philippines

1999 20 people died in a hotel in Changchun, China

1997 91 people died in a hotel in Thailand

1995 30 people died in a hotel in Anshan, China

1993 20 people died in a hotel in Illinois, USA

1986 97 people died in a hotel in San Juan, Puerto Rico, USA

1980 84 people died in a hotel in Las Vegas, USA

1977 302 people died in a hotel in Brussels

Table 1: Fatal hotel fires. The above only represents a small

proportion of the hotel fires where fatalities and injuries have

occurred.


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The future

So what does the future hold for us?Certainly there is confusion,misunderstanding, inconsistentenforcement, a lack of information anda situation that, I believe, can only getworse. At least under the previoussystem, when you checked into a hotelyou could assume that an establishmenthad a fire certificate or had applied forone. Now a guest knows nothing at all.If you look at the hotel that wasfeatured on the BBC programme, forexample, the management had decidedto create a fire exit through a bedroombut had not provided a means ofopening it from the outside. How longwould that have been before it wasdiscovered or a fire occurred? Many ofthe tourist organisations would haveyou believe that they look at fireprecautions but what training do theyhave and are they effective? Myexperience leads me to believe that theyhave very little impact on fire safety atall.

But it is unlikely that we will moveaway from a risk assessment approach,so I feel that the introduction of acredible, independent third partyaccreditation scheme for our buildingsis one solution that could work. Thesystem would have to cover allbuildings – both old and new – andshould be carried out by professionalsto a recognised standard. If the regimeunder the RRO can be run effectively,then it can be a very good thing forboth the community and the fireservice.

We don’t want to go back to the daysof the fire and rescue service dictatingto businesses how to run theiroperations safely, because fire safetyhas to be a team effort in which we allhave an important part to play. After all,there are often several ways of ensuringpeople’s risk to fire is reduced, or if onedoes break out, at least that it isreasonably contained.

Alan Cox is a fire and safety consultant. He

has held senior fire safety posts in the public

and private sector.

officers out immediately to inspect thepremises. It was also interesting that thefire service admitted they had not beento this building since it was built about20 years ago, and they had not thoughtabout their new responsibilities for thistype of building under the forthcominglegislation.

Comparison

To their credit, some fire and rescueservices are working hard to bringhotels up to speed with modernrequirements but some have missed thepoint about fire risk assessments – it’sup to the building owner to carry outthe risk assessment. If a fire service isnot happy with it, it should say so andgive reasons, not simply dictate a list ofwork that the owner has to complywith. A determined hotel owner couldmake a very good case for not installingan automatic detector in a bedroomwith no smoking, a fire door, PAT testedextinguishers and trained staff – whereis the risk now?

Last September I stayed in a hotel onwhich the local fire authority hadalready served an enforcement noticewhich stated that the fire detectionsystem was inadequate. But in addition,I found:● numerous fire doors were wedged

open and some without self-closingdevices

● numerous fire doors did not have fireor smoke seals or with excessive gaps

● poorly sited fire detectorsI wrote to the owner about these andreceived a reply indicating that theseitems would be rectified. Incidentally, tosee a graphic illustration of the huge gap

that needs to be closed by premisesowners in complying with currentlegislation, look at the public registerkept by the Cornwall Country FireBrigade at: www.cornwall.gov.uk

Legacy issues

In my own experience, I find that about80% of buildings in this category havesignificant failings in public areas alone.While some of these problems havearisen due to inadequate fire riskassessments, many have been there for along time.

The guidance under the RegulatoryReform Order states: “If a FireCertificate has been issued in respect ofyour premises or the premises werebuilt to recent building regulations, aslong as you have made no materialalterations and all the physical fireprecautions have been properlymaintained, then it is unlikelyyou willneed to make any significantimprovements to your existing physicalfire protection arrangements to complywith the Order.”While this is probablythe case with recent buildings, it maynot be so for older ones, for which firecertificates may have been issuedseveral years or more earlier whenstandards were lower. But in manycases, owners and consultants look atthe guidance under the RRO andbelieve that, as the building previouslyhad a fire certificate and hasn’tchanged, it must be OK. But isn’t thisthe time for the fire authorities to bringthem up to today’s standards? Clearly,many are doing just that but I feel thatboth they and the hotel industry havemissed the point of risk assessments.

“During the course of theinvestigation I visited 14three-star hotels, 13 ofwhich were not up to therequired standards”

‘Holiday flats’ with no protected escape routes and a fire door removed


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