Building Regulations (Review) Bill [HL]

Lord McKenzie of Luton Excerpts

Friday 4th March 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Knight of Weymouth]

My Lords, I want, briefly, to reinforce the comments made by the noble Lord, Lord Best. I do so as a former patron of the national fire sprinkler campaign and former chair of the Fire Safety Council. That was some years ago now and I do not currently have any interest in that area. When I was Schools Minister I ensured that the attitude towards sprinklers in schools was shifted significantly so that only the very lowest-risk schools in terms of fire would be exempt from installing sprinklers. That took a lot of ministerial heavy lifting when officials were giving contrary advice, so I urge the Minister to adopt such a policy if he is hearing all the reasons why not to do something when the case made by my noble friend Lord Harrison has been so strong in respect of the views of fire officers.

In the work that I have done over the years with fire officers—I pay tribute, in particular, to Peter Holland the chief fire officer at Lancashire—they have consistently said, “This is about saving lives for probably the cost of installing carpets in a building”. For that cost a huge amount is to be gained. Once you get into residential installations you are starting to achieve the sort of scale that can drive innovation. The noble Lord speaking from the Liberal Democrat Benches talked about the cost of tanking. Tanking systems are often but not necessarily used. If there is good enough water pressure—negotiation needs to be had with the water companies there—it is possible to go ahead with a small sprinkler system without using a tanking system.

Similarly, there may be other ways of scoring innovations. There has been some discussion about using the piping within a central heating system in a residential dwelling, and indeed using the water pump from the central heating system to supply a sprinkler system. Such innovations can be tested better, as they are in Wales, when we start to do residential systems. The comments of the noble Lord, Lord Best, about design freedom should be taken into account by the Department for Communities and Local Government—and not just design freedom within properties where some of the passive protections that can be quite frustrating to homeowners can be removed. Indeed, many of us have seen fire doors propped open which means that all the effectiveness of those passive measures is lost. There is also potential design freedom within new estates where the risk assessment from the fire authority is such that you might not need quite the same turning circles for large fire vehicles because the risk around fatalities in fires is so much reduced by having a sprinklered estate.

I urge the Minister to be sympathetic to my noble friend’s very modest proposal. I draw his attention to the first word of Clause 1—“Within”—and I hope that if he accepts the 30-month proposal, the drive is still on to get it as soon as possible. We should have in mind the story of the fire officer related by my noble friend Lord Harrison. As you wait an additional 18 months the lives of yet more fire officers and residents will be at risk.

[Lord McKenzie of Luton]

Briefly, I support my noble friend's Bill and the amendment and pay tribute to his persistence and dedication on the issue of fire safety. I support the amendment with reluctance, because the Bill is perfectly adequate as it stands, but my noble friend has gone the extra mile by extending the time.

Given that extension, what assurance can the Minister give us on funding for ongoing community fire safety activity, which has been at the heart of driving down the number of deaths from fires in this country? Since we last debated this at Second Reading, we have had the CLG publication, Future Changes to the Buildings Regulations—Next Steps. In Part B, on fire safety, it states about the consultation:

“However, this exercise has not produced any significant new evidence on the health and safety benefits of greater sprinkler provision that would alter the cost/benefit analysis and the basis of the current approach. The Department will not, therefore, be considering this as part of next year’s programme of work”.

It seems an odd position to take that the Government do not want to engage in or encourage new research but are happy to rely on current research, which has been a bone of contention—we debated the BRE research previously under the Bill—as the benchmark to say that there is no new evidence. That is a rather perverse way to proceed.

On the summary of work to be taken forward from the consultation exercise, I am certainly pleased to see that Part P, to do with electrical safety, will be in next year's work programme, because there is interrelation with issues of fire safety. About 8,000 deaths in the home are caused by inadequate electrical work. I would hope that that will focus on greater use of competent person's schemes. Paragraph 3.4 states:

“Finally, there is also a third group of issues that we believe currently lack clear evidence to support regulation in 2013, but which we would not wish to definitively rule out. This includes whether to expand the provisions for radon gas protection and whether flood resilience/resistance should be incorporated into regulations”.

My second question for the Minister is: where does that leave the review of Part B? What is the programme for review in Part B, or will the Government continue to oppose the Bill and the research that it seeks and rely on the status quo of research, therefore closing their minds to further review of that important part of the building regulations to deal with fire safety?

I support my noble friend and his amendment, although I think that the Government should have been more encouraging and not have required him to seek this extension.

[Baroness Smith of Basildon]

I support my noble friend Lord Harrison’s amendment and his Bill. At the Dispatch Box in our previous debate, the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, referred to “Groundhog Day”. A number of us in the Chamber today feel the same sense that we have been here before. I pay enormous tribute to the tenacity and commitment of my noble friend Lord Harrison for the work that he has undertaken to drive this forward. He has not been prepared to let the issue drop. He wants to continue purely in the interests of public safety. The same goes for my noble friend Lord McKenzie of Luton, given his former role at the Dispatch Box and his commitment. My noble friend Lord Knight of Weymouth will remember many discussions on the way forward on this when I was the fire Minister and he was an education Minister. As he said, I am pleased that we were able to make such progress.

I support the amendment—with some reservations, like my noble friend, Lord McKenzie; but it will get my support. I am not sure that it is necessary, but if the Minister thinks that it helps and if that is what it takes to move the issue forward, get the research and assessment we need, I am happy to support that. I am grateful to the Minister for the meeting between his officials and my noble friend Lord Harrison, because that is what led to him proposing the amendment.