Hospitals: Fire Prevention

(asked on 27th June 2017) - View Source

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what resources have been made available to local NHS trusts for fire safety inspections at hospitals in Lambeth and Southwark.


Answered by
Philip Dunne Portrait
Philip Dunne
This question was answered on 11th July 2017

As part of the response to the tragic events at the Grenfell Tower, actions have been implemented across the National Health Service to assess the risks of similar issues and ensure that the NHS estate is safe. All NHS trusts, including those with buildings in Lambeth and Southwark, as well as all trusts across London, have in the past weeks provided assurance that they have undertaken a fire risk assessment in the past 12 months.

Fire safety checks of NHS facilities are regularly undertaken in line with legislation and guidance. Hospitals are well prepared – each one has a tailored fire safety plan. But nothing is more important than the safety of patients and staff, so on a precautionary basis we have asked all hospitals to conduct additional checks.

Jim Mackey, Chief Executive of NHS Improvement instigated new inspections by local fire and rescue services on 24 June 2017, which has continued across the NHS.

By their nature, these fire safety inspections do not require significant resources to be deployed by the NHS trusts themselves.

Reticulating Splines