Fire and Rescue Services Bill

Mr. David Amess (Southend, West) (Con): I have the honour to be joint-chairman, with the hon. Member for Barnsley, West and Penistone (Mr. Clapham), of the all-party fire safety group. I may be biased, but I think that it is a splendid all-party group: our meetings are extremely well attended and the contributions are well informed. The Minister for Local Government, Regional Governance and Fire would have addressed our seminar today, had it not been for the difficulty in doing that and addressing the House at the same time.

I listened carefully to what my hon. Friend the Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Mr. Hammond) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk, Coastal (Mr. Gummer) said about regionalisation. The House is well aware of the Opposition's view on that matter. Communities faced with the threatened closure of the local fire station are greatly concerned that there will not be proper consultation because of regionalisation. I was greatly concerned to hear one chief fire officer say today, "People are not as afraid of fire as they are of crime." I think that there is something in that comment, and I hope to touch on that during my speech.

During my time as a Member of Parliament, my admiration for the fire services has grown, for poignant reasons. When campaigning in the 80s, I went into a garden where a constituent who was well known in the area was on fire—I know it sounds incredible, but he had fallen into a bowl of paraffin. Most of us would not be prepared for such a sight and I probably did not react in the best possible way—if one is not used to such things, one goes into a state of shock, much as one wants to help. Although I did get help and the fire brigade was summoned, the man had 95 per cent. burns and I attended his funeral the day after I was re-elected. My admiration for the way in which the fire service dealt with that tragedy will live with me for ever more.

In another terrible tragedy that occurred in the '80s in my then constituency, firefighters attended an incident at one of our schools in which four youngsters locked themselves into a hut in the playground and were burned alive. How the fire officers coped with that tragedy, I do not know. I suspect that my hon. Friend the Member for Upminster (Angela Watkinson) was on Essex county council at the time of another incident. We ran a campaign to put smoke detectors in a challenging housing estate but unfortunately, the batteries were removed from one of the detectors and a whole family was wiped out.

When I moved to my present constituency, I took part, perhaps naively, in a march to save our local fire station in Leigh. On that march, I was assaulted. One fire officer allowed my assailant to escape, but another caught the assailant and he was duly dealt with. To the Under-Secretary of State, the hon. Member for Corby (Phil Hope), who is to reply to the debate, I say that I much regret the bad publicity and bad reputation that some of our firefighters accrued during the dispute, because I have the highest regard for the wonderful work that they do.
During our seminar, the view was expressed that the best way to eliminate fire death, injury and damage is by preventing fires breaking out in the first place—no one could doubt that—and that any attempt to improve fire safety must target resources. I—a Conservative Member of Parliament referring to the Fire Brigades Union—am anxious to be assured that the Government's motives are not dominated by the desire to achieve cuts in costs. If emergency fire cover is to be more flexible and more focused on safeguarding lives in future, we must be confident that the fire-protection measures in our buildings are up to scratch. The hon. Member for South Dorset (Jim Knight) feels very strongly about sprinklers, and I share his concern, but he will know that our American guest speaker told those attending our seminar today that 16 per cent. of sprinklers in the city of Boston, I believe, do not work properly. Wonderful though sprinklers can be, they must be properly serviced.

The seminar also arrived at the view that sensible fire safety design was essential and that there should be appropriate product specification.

That would also mean ensuring that fire protection is installed correctly and maintained in good working order—I have already mentioned the problem of batteries being removed from smoke detectors. A mature framework is needed in which active and passive fire protection systems can work in concert instead of being in competition with one another, as they are at the moment.

I do not want to condemn the Bill, as it includes some good provisions. However, my hon. Friend the Member for Runnymede and Weybridge has convinced me of the merits of our reasoned amendment. I accept that the primary aim of the Bill is to reduce fire deaths and injuries, of which there are respectively about 600 and 16,500 a year. The House will applaud the introduction of a new statutory duty requiring the fire and rescue services to do more to prevent fires in the first place in addition to being prepared to extinguish them. The services have done their job magnificently in the past, but increasingly they need to look at ways of tackling 21st-century fire risks. Their effectiveness and public safety are likely to be enhanced by fire safety education, fire prevention schemes and local partnerships. Such activity is at the heart of community fire safety. The other main planks of the reform agenda are sensible. For instance, it is reasonable to allow a fire authority to vary levels of emergency response at different times of the day according to the fire risks posed.

We have heard a great deal about what fire officers have said about the Bill. I am delighted that Mr. David Turner, chief fire officer for Essex, is leading a national fire chiefs group to co-ordinate the response to the Bill. It would be a lengthy undertaking to compare the Bill with the Fire Services Act 1947, but fire officers are concerned about who would be in charge when two different brigades attend a fire, as happens from time to time. Chief fire officers hoped that there would be flexible provisions allowing for the generation of income from, for example, training courses for the public. However, provisions in the 1947 Act will still apply.

Concerns were also voiced in the parliamentary seminar about houses in multiple occupation. The definition of an HMO in the Housing Bill is intricate. The old definition in section 345 of the Housing Act 1985 and the case law arising from it are notorious for their complexity. The new definition is a gallant attempt at improvement, but I wonder how well it will work in practice. There was also concern about the details of training, but I accept that they will be announced in the autumn. Section 30 of the 1947 Act states that the senior fire officer present at a fire is in charge, and can direct resources accordingly. The all-party group on fire safety, however, believes that the Bill does not state who would now be in charge of directing available resources.

There was also concern that people were getting on a bandwagon, with many individuals offering to conduct fire safety risk assessments. People attending the seminar felt strongly that only qualified staff should be allowed to undertake registration and accreditation. I shall certainly support the reasoned amendment. The Bill is well intentioned, but I have great concerns about regionalisation. I repeat that the general public are afraid of crime, so I hope to goodness that in future they will be extremely afraid of the threat of fire.