Fire Safety (Protection of Tenants) Bill

Alison Seabeck Excerpts

Friday 19th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Adrian Sanders (Torbay) (LD)]

I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.

I wish to declare an interest as the part-owner of two properties, one of which is currently rented out. I want to thank many groups and individuals who have assisted in the creation of the Bill. Chief among them has been the sterling contribution of the Devon and Somerset fire and rescue service—both the officers and the chairman of the authority, Conservative Councillor Mark Healey. There have been contributions from fire officers around the country, landlord and tenant groups, the fire safety industry and many others. Also, I want to thank the hon. Members for Totnes (Dr Wollaston) and for Plymouth, Moor View (Alison Seabeck), both from Devon, who have given their support to the Bill.

Today, over 80% of homes have smoke alarms, compared with 9% in 1987, and between 1988 and 2008 fire deaths halved. There are, though, far too many deaths and injuries from fire. In the last year for which figures are available, 331 people died as a result of residential fires. Of these, 222—two thirds—occurred when there was no working smoke alarm. In 137 cases there was no detection system at all. Is it not possible to argue that a working smoke alarm could have saved one of those 222 lives or helped prevent one of the 9,066 non-fatal casualties from that year?

Although substantial progress has been made in recent years, we are in danger of retrenchment. The spending review has brought substantial cuts to the Government’s awareness campaigns, and fire authorities across the country are contemplating bringing an end to programmes such as providing free battery-operated smoke alarms, as budget cuts take hold. Many fire authorities have carried out sterling work, not only increasing public awareness of the need to have working alarms, but through a range of other fire safety measures. I pay tribute to the hard work of Devon and Somerset fire and rescue service on a range of prevention activities. Indeed, following a serious fire in my constituency, the authority installed more than 1,200 new smoke alarms in just two months.

Building regulations currently dictate that new build, extensions and alterations should be equipped with hard-wired smoke alarms. Furniture regulations also play their part in reducing avoidable domestic fires or lessening their impact. Figures show that as awareness of fire safety increases, deaths and injuries decrease. Yet casualties are preventable, and fires, sadly, continue. We have seen a number of tragic fire deaths in recent months, quite often involving rented properties. There are gaps in the regulations governing fire prevention. Outside of houses in multiple occupation it is only guidance or good practice that governs the provision of smoke and fire detection.

The majority of landlords in the private and social sectors ensure that smoke alarms are available. They not only provide safety and reassurance for tenants, but are in the interests of landlords. Many landlords to whom I have spoken have been under the false impression that fitting smoke alarms is already a statutory duty. However, a minority of rented homes do not have smoke alarms, and they may well hold some of the most vulnerable members of our society. There is a correlation between the propensity for fire and the lack of fire safety devices. In 2001, the Association of British Insurers highlighted the fact that 81% of homes in total had smoke alarms, but less than 60% of homes suffering fires had alarms.

Promoting voluntary good practice among landlords has been very positive. The number of landlords becoming accredited is increasing, which offers tenants reassurance not only that their property will be relatively safer, but that the landlord appreciates the duty of care they have towards tenants. However, in my constituency, only an estimated 5% of landlords have become accredited, and only an estimated 15% are members of the excellent and highly professional landlords association in south Devon, of which I am a member. Sadly, the majority of private sector landlords do not join landlords associations, where best practice can be shared and standards raised. The good landlords pay a heavy price in reputation for the actions of the bad.

Social housing providers also need to ensure that they are working to best practice. When a recent house fire in my constituency highlighted the issue of fire safety, it was found that about one quarter of the houses belonging to the largest social housing provider, Riviera Housing Trust, had no smoke alarm. Much to its credit, the trust has now pledged to ensure that all properties have working smoke alarms. However, if a housing association can provide a service to vulnerable people without needing to ensure safety from fire, Government guidelines are clearly lacking.

[Alison Seabeck (Plymouth, Moor View) (Lab)]

I am listening intently to the hon. Gentleman’s comments. Will he tell the House exactly what conversations he has had with Ministers in the Department for Communities and Local Government, either on the housing or the fire side, about the nature of his Bill?

[Mr Sanders]

Since the Bill was published—four and a half months ago—I have made repeated attempts to arrange a meeting with the Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill), who has responsibility for fire, but I have met another junior Minister, who kindly allowed me to talk things through with civil servants. However, I was shocked this morning when the Under-Secretary said to me that if I withdrew my Bill, I could have a meeting with him. That was an insult to the people who have died in fires and their relatives.

The key word is “guidelines”. The housing health and safety rating system highlights 29 factors that may be taken into consideration by local authorities when assessing risk to all residential properties. If fire is seen as a category 1 hazard, enforcement action can be taken. Other guidance documents over recent years have stressed the importance of smoke alarms, but still local authorities are free to do as little about it as they wish. A number of cases have highlighted the need for better regulation. At an inquest into a fatal fire in Yarcombe near Honiton in Devon in May 2008, the coroner resolved to contact DCLG Ministers urging them to review whether smoke detection could be made mandatory in rented domestic dwellings. To date, DCLG has not responded positively.

Earlier this year, there were fire deaths in two incidents in Northumberland, at Ashington and Bedlington. Three people died in total and in neither fire were there any working alarms. In September, an elderly woman died in a fire in Porlock, Somerset. Again the fire authority found no smoke alarms. Indeed, fire officers have told me that they have never attended a fatal fire where working smoke alarms have been present, and the number of cases reported in the local press of smoke alarms saving families from death and/or injury is significant. There should be a straightforward solution to this problem.

In 2004, the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister Committee, of which I was a member, produced a report on the fire service with the following recommendation:

“We believe that functioning smoke alarms save lives and reduce injuries. The Committee congratulates those Fire Services which operate initiatives to fit free smoke alarms for the vulnerable. We welcome the requirement for alarms to be hard-wired in alterations, extensions and new buildings. We recommend this requirement be extended to include all existing tenanted properties, housing of multiple occupation and housing for vulnerable members of society. If the design of such buildings makes installation of hard-wired alarms impossible, we recommend use of alarms fitted with 10 year batteries.”

This Bill seeks to implement the Select Committee’s recommendations, which are still on the table, six years later. It will ensure that all landlords provide a working hard-wired fire detection system at the start of any tenancy agreement. That will be a legal requirement, in the same way that a landlord must have the gas system certified annually, an electrical safety check, and an energy performance certificate. From commencement of the tenancy, responsibility shifts to the tenant, who should refrain from causing damage to the system, and report any problems punctually, in the same way that the vast majority of tenants already do with all aspects of their home. As one of the Devon and Somerset fire officers said, when someone buys a car, it has to come with a seat belt. After that, it is the responsibility of the driver to use it properly. The same applies to smoke alarms. It seems eminently sensible that rented properties should be safe at the start of a tenancy, but it is equally sensible that the tenant should take responsibility for their safety after that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Alison Seabeck (Plymouth, Moor View) (Lab)]

I warmly congratulate the hon. Member for Torbay (Mr Sanders) on introducing this important piece of legislation. I will not detain the House for long with my own comments, but I want to offer my party’s support for this measure. I am pleased to see two former firefighters in the Chamber today. The comments made by my hon. Friend the Member for Poplar and Limehouse (Jim Fitzpatrick) were entirely apt. Sadly, the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, the hon. Member for Hemel Hempstead (Mike Penning), is no longer in his place, but he is unable to contribute to the debate anyway as he now sits on the Front Bench. Otherwise, I am sure that he would have some very strong views on the Bill.

In yesterday’s debate in Westminster Hall initiated by the hon. Member for Loughborough (Nicky Morgan), we heard about the tragic death of two people in a house in multiple occupation in the constituency of the hon. Member for Milton Keynes North (Mark Lancaster) who, in an emotional speech, highlighted the figures that we have heard again today, which confirm the very high number of deaths in HMOs. We know that there is some protection for those living in HMOs, but it is clearly inadequate. The hon. Gentleman confirmed that the problem existed across the whole private sector. That sector has raised its standards and the quality of its accommodation in recent years, but I am afraid that there are still rogue landlords.

I have met representatives of Devon and Somerset fire service and had a very useful conversation with them. They flagged up the number of very serious incidents in their area, and it is quite frightening and wholly unacceptable that we should simply stand by and allow this to continue, particularly when the number of deaths caused by fires where there is no hard-wired smoke alarm exceeds the number caused by electrocution and gas malfunction by a ratio of more than 5:1.

Why are the Government not supporting this measure? How can the Minister justify rigidly sticking to the one- in, one-out regulation restriction, which I believe is the block on this wholly laudable attempt to improve fire safety, given that more than 200 lives have been lost as a direct result of the lack of a secure smoke alarm? I urge him to allow the Bill to progress into Committee, so that the hon. Member for Torbay can continue to explore options for some kind of joint safety certificate, perhaps bringing existing regulations into one simple duty, linking energy, gas, electricity and fire safety checks. Even on its own, the provision of hard-wired smoke alarms would not be an enormous burden for landlords, not least because I would expect insurance companies to view more kindly a property with such alarms with regard not only to buildings insurance but to tenants’ contents insurance. The hon. Gentleman has set out some of the costs involved. Why is it right that new build properties that are rented offer this safe standard, yet it is not appropriate for people in older properties? Apparently, it is okay for those people to live in unsafe conditions.

During a debate on delegated legislation this week, the Minister for Housing and Local Government seemed to dismiss the importance of fire deaths in HMOs. In response to a question from me, he said:

“I imagine that the hon. Lady is not suggesting that the change in legislation in October led to some of those terrible fires”.—[Official Report, Fourth Delegated Legislation Committee, 16 November 2010; c. 12.]

Well, actually, yes I am, in relation to the further deregulation of HMOs. We have the evidence, and we know that more than one third of the fires where there was no smoke alarm were in HMOs. That is why we continue to oppose the move further to deregulate that type of property and to oppose the increase in that type of property. If the Government want to put right that wrong, at least in part, they will not talk out the Bill today but allow it to go into Committee.

Let me touch on the anticipated growth in the private rented sector and houses in multiple occupation as a result of loosening HMO regulation and of changes to housing benefit. The figures from the Department for Work and Pensions suggest a requirement of at least an additional 88,000 bedsit accommodations. I fear that some landlords—admittedly, a minority—will subdivide homes with plywood to cram people in and fail in their duty to protect their tenants with a perfectly sensible and easy-to-install hard-wired fire alarm. When we have had the first fire death in such properties, will the Minister come back to the House to justify his position of talking out the Bill, or will he allow it to proceed? It is in his hands, and we will listen closely to his response.

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[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Robert Neill)]

Let me start by declaring an interest, which can be found in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests, as the owner of a residential property from which rental income is received.

I congratulate the hon. Member for Torbay (Mr Sanders) on his Bill, which raises important issues. I am the last person to denigrate or minimise the risks involved or the importance of fire prevention, and I am sure that the hon. Gentleman did not intend to suggest otherwise by anything that he said. The Government are committed to recognising the importance of fire prevention, and continuing prevention work. We could debate the ways and means of achieving our aim and whether primary legislation is ideal for the purpose, but I trust that Members in all parts of the House are committed to protecting people from the risk of fire.

Let me give some background to the debate and, in doing so, refer to Members’ helpful contributions. I have listened carefully to what has been said, but let me say something about the work that has been done so far, some of which was mentioned by the hon. Member for Poplar and Limehouse (Jim Fitzpatrick). I am delighted to see him in the House today, and I welcome him to the debate. He has a high reputation in the fire community as someone who served bravely as a firefighter and was also an excellent fire Minister. I weigh his words with considerable respect, and take note of them. On his watch and that of other Ministers, real progress has been made in improving fire safety.

Beside me on the Front Bench is the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead (Mike Penning). When he was in a position to speak on these matters, he was himself a doughty campaigner for fire safety, and, like the hon. Member for Poplar and Limehouse, he has served as a firefighter on the front line. I pay due heed to those who really understand these matters.

Co-ordinated fire safety strategies have been in place for some years, and they have been very successful. The number of fire deaths in the home in England has halved since the 1980s, and the long-term trend is downwards. In 2008—the last year for which we have fully published figures—213 people sadly perished in accidental fires in the home, compared with 363 in 1995. That is a reduction of some 40%, which is clearly welcome. The long-term trend for non-fatal fire casualties is also downwards: in 2008 there were 9,200 such casualties, compared with 13,844 in 1995. Those are significant and worthwhile reductions. I hope it goes without saying that one fire death is one too many, but that is worth restating none the less. The tragic events at the fatal house fire in Bridlington last week, where three children died, brings into sharp relief the importance of fire safety and fire prevention. I am sure the thoughts of all Members go out to the relatives and friends of the family.

When I was leader of the London fire and civil defence authority, as part of my duties I met people who had lost relatives in fires. One fire death is a tragedy and a disaster for everybody involved. Although we should recognise that some good work has been done, recent statistics suggest that the long-term downward trend, to which I referred, may be beginning to plateau, and therefore it is right that the hon. Member for Torbay raises this subject. We are all interested to see whether those statistics are correct, and if so, how we can find steps to drive down the number of fire deaths still further. The question is the means by which we do so.

[Alison Seabeck]

Will the hon. Gentleman tell us when he last met organisations such as the fire commission and the Fire Protection Association to discuss how we reach those ends?

[Robert Neill]

I have had a raft of meetings with organisations across the fire sector. I will not pretend off the top of my head that I recall those particular ones, but I regularly meet representatives of, for example, the Chief Fire Officers Association, the fire prevention industries and the Fire Brigades Union, and I continue to keep in touch with them. I am aware that these issues are often discussed with Housing Ministers as responsibilities overlap here. Under this Administration, the door of our Department is always open to professional and voluntary organisations that want to raise issues with us.

[Alison Seabeck]

rose—

[Robert Neill]

If the hon. Lady wants to suggest more people whom it will be useful for me to meet, I am happy for her to do so.

[Alison Seabeck]

I am aware that the fire commission, which is part of the Local Government Association, has requested a meeting with the Minister. I hope that it will get a positive response.

[Robert Neill]

I have in fact met the Local Government Association’s fire forum on more than one occasion. I have attended its meetings and have had meetings with its chairman, Councillor Brian Coleman, and other leading members. I have already made it clear that I have a regular series of debates, but I am grateful to the hon. Lady for raising that point. I am sure that if the fire commission wishes to raise a specific issue, it will ask for a further meeting and I will happily oblige, as I hope I have always tried to do.

Although there has been success, we can never be complacent; we wish to drive the number of deaths down further. The Government’s key strategy is to drive down the number of preventable fire deaths through community fire safety activity. I say “drive down” the number because, tragically, there will be some instances where, despite everything being done, it is not possible to save someone. We want to get the numbers down to the irreducible minimum, of course. The strategy is to drive down the number of preventable fire deaths through community fire safety activities, in which the hon. Member for Poplar and Limehouse took a leading part when he was a Minister. The strategy involves efforts to reduce the number of fires through education, information and publicity. The installation of properly maintained smoke alarms in every household is at the centre of efforts to reduce fire death in the home, as they provide important and vital early warning of fire and can help people to escape. The Fire Kills campaign has for some time conducted high profile campaigns promoting smoke alarms and maintenance messages, which have proved very successful.

The English housing survey 2008, published last month, shows ownership of smoke alarms in all dwellings in England standing at 91%. It is a significant achievement for the Department for Communities and Local Government and the fire and rescue service that nine out of every 10 homes have a smoke alarm installed. I am grateful that the hon. Member for Torbay mentioned the excellent work of Devon and Somerset fire and rescue service, its firefighters and chief officers and the chairman of the authority. He is absolutely right: all of them do fine work. There has been great consistency of application by fire and rescue authorities. Circumstances vary, but much work is being done and Devon and Somerset is a good example.

Although that is a significant achievement, we aim to raise that percentage even further because, as the hon. Gentleman said and I accept, there is evidence that those without fire alarms—the remaining 10%—are often in the groups who are at the most risk from fire. Furthermore, there is concern arising from some statistics that show the importance of not only fitting alarms, but making sure that they are properly maintained. In some cases, sadly, there is evidence that a smoke alarm failed to operate—the battery had gone flat or had even been removed. There are also instances—one of the recent fires reported to this House among them—showing that even the provision of a properly working smoke alarm cannot guarantee that lives will be saved. In one of the fires I mentioned, the smoke alarm operated properly, waking and alerting those in the neighbouring house, but, for reasons that are not yet apparent, not enabling the occupants of the house to make their escape.

When we look at changes in technology—we have heard about 10-year life batteries or hardwired alarms, which I am happy to discuss further with hon. Members on both sides of the House—it is also worth considering the fact that, in many cases, death is caused not by smoke inhalation, but by carbon monoxide poisoning. We should consider seriously whether dual-sensor arrangements should be brought much more to the fore, moving the position on yet further. I hope that we can discuss that. By no means am I closing the door to potentially better ways of improving safety.