Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent assessment his Department has made of the adequacy of the Incident Reporting System on fires caused by electricity.
The Home Office regularly considers how best to review both the IRS functionality and data collection, to ensure they continue to meet the needs of FRSs and other data users, particularly in light of the Fire Reform Agenda.
Fires related to mobile phone chargers are currently captured under the category ‘Battery Charger’ and although there is not a specific category for e-cigarettes, FRSs record fires related to these under the ‘other’ category.
Home Office officials have regular discussions with fire and rescue services about the data collected through the Incident Recording System and collect feedback about the IRS to feed into future reviews.