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THE REGULATORY REFORM (FIRE SAFETY) ORDER 2005 => Q & A => Topic started by: Gary Howe on December 02, 2005, 03:30:28 PM
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When this order comes into force (April 2006) will it have any effect on the way the Fire and Rescue service offer advice in terms of fire safety, the Fire Services Act, 1947 will still apply:
Provision of fire services
1 (1) (f) efficient arrangements for the giving, when requested, of advice in respect of buildings and other property in the area of the fire authority as to fire prevention, restricting the spread of fires, and means of escape in case of fire.
With reference to fire risk assessments will be a limit on advice, or will this be down to the individual FPO on the ground, has anyone any experience of dealing with FPO's and their view/stance on a completed FRA.
And secondly if they come across a building that has not completed a FRA, I assume they point them in the direction of suitable guidance documentation to help them complete the FRA.
All views appreciated.
Regards
Gary.
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If you are a reasonably big business the advice will be "do a risk assessment".
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When this order comes into force (April 2006) will it have any effect on the way the Fire and Rescue service offer advice in terms of fire safety, the Fire Services Act, 1947 will still apply:
Provision of fire services
1 (1) (f) efficient arrangements for the giving, when requested, of advice in respect of buildings and other property in the area of the fire authority as to fire prevention, restricting the spread of fires, and means of escape in case of fire.
With reference to fire risk assessments will be a limit on advice, or will this be down to the individual FPO on the ground, has anyone any experience of dealing with FPO's and their view/stance on a completed FRA.
And secondly if they come across a building that has not completed a FRA, I assume they point them in the direction of suitable guidance documentation to help them complete the FRA.
All views appreciated.
Regards
Gary.
1st question: Ask Colin!!!!
2nd
: It is not London Policy to issue enforcement or prosecution for failing to have a FRA. However, it is possible (but perhaps not likely) that prosecution could occur if advice is later ignored although follow up visits soley to check on FRA will not happen.
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The Fire Services Act, 1947 no longer applies. The full section on fire safety in the Fire and Rescue Services Act 2004 reads (my upper case):
6 Fire safety
(1) A fire and rescue authority (FRA) must make provision for the purpose of promoting fire safety in its area.
(2) In making provision under subsection (1) a fire and rescue authority must in particular, TO THE EXTENT THAT IT CONSIDERS IT REASONABLE TO DO SO, make arrangements for-
(a) the provision of information, publicity and encouragement in respect of the steps to be taken to prevent fires and death or injury by fire;
(b) the giving of advice, on request, about-
(i) how to prevent fires and restrict their spread in buildings and other property;
(ii) the means of escape from buildings and other property in case of fire.
The phrase in upper case does seem to give FRAs a lot of latitude. I think that you are right Gary, the FRA will give general rather than specific guidance.
I agree with Messy that the LFB will not issue an enforcement notice if the only failure to comply with the FSO is the failure to do a fire risk assessment. If there are other more serious failings then an enforcement notice or prosecution are options. The failure to carry out a FRA would be part of the notice.
It is interesting to note that for FSO enforcement notices there is only a requirement for the authority to detail the failure to comply, not how to comply.
I wonder how far authorities will go selling advice. The LFB sell various courses - http://www.london-fire.gov.uk/fire_safety/at_work/fst_intro.asp - Will this be expanded to include training on how to do fire risk assessment?
Perhaps commercial premises will be able to pay the fire authority to do their fire risk assessment. Fire authorities have plenty of spare orange folders to put the significant findings in.
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Risk assessment
9.—(1) The responsible person must make a suitable and sufficient assessment of the risks to
which relevant persons are exposed for the purpose of identifying the general fire precautions he
needs to take to comply with the requirements and prohibitions imposed on him by or under this
Order.
Article 9 from the fire Safety Order, reproduced above by kind permission of Her Majesty, seems pretty clear that not having made a suitable and sufficient assessment, is illegal.
Whether that actually means some form of tangible written or electronic (subject to five or more etc.), is still open to debate.
On the second bit about charging...I think London are playing a bit of a dodgy game. In my view FRS should never carry out FRA, for money or otherwise. Why not go back to certification? There is also the concept of unfair trade, if FRS charges commercial rates then they are making excess profits because they are already levying a precept. If they undercut commercial rates they are dissing Colin and his colleagues. The whole issue of commercial trading by local autthorities is complex and liable to create conflicts of interests. London's engineering team should resign, set up a trading company and rent the space back from the LFEPA. (If I have got that all wrong, I apologise in advance...third glass of port)!
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Whether the commercial unit has plans to set up a FRA course, I don't know, but as long as they stick to agreed standards I cannot see it being an issue. But London do not carry out actual Fire Risk Assessments commercially. (except on their own property which is iffy enough- How can an authority police and/or prosecute itself if its gets something wrong!!?)
With regards enforcement notices. Whilst, when issuing an enforcement notice the authority is not obliged to provide a method of how to comply, LFB policy is that they will give as many options to the occupier as possible, which if completed, would satisfy the authority.
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The failure to carry out the FRA is a breach but not necessarily an offence. Many FRSs take the view that they will not give advice about the FRA, but will just refer the person, as Brian implies, to suitable guidance or competent persons. Their reasoning is that they cannot get too involved in the FRA and then go and police it. (ps too much port gives you gout).
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Offences
32.—(1) It is an offence for any responsible person or any other person mentioned in article 5(3)
to—
(a) fail to comply with any requirement or prohibition imposed by articles 8 to 22 and 38
(fire safety duties) where that failure places one or more relevant persons at risk of death
or serious injury in case of fire;
Article 9 is included in the list of offences.
Whilst I agree that 'it is not necessarily an offence', if there is no risk of death etc.... if it is demonstrable to a court that failure to carry a FRA out lead to 'risk of death or serious injury' then surely that is an offence and the culprit is liable to a fine. I'm not sure I understand the difference between a breach and an offence if both could lead to a conviction.
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Both cannot. You have made the point yourself. If it is not clear, it must be the port. Ask your civil service chums about the concept that they called ''decriminalization of minor breaches''. (They probably spellt it with an s, rather than a z though, because, as you know, the standard of English education amongst civil servants is not what it used to be.) It was a concept introduced into the WFPL, and is carried over into the RRO. Failure to carry out an FRA is a clear and indisputable breach of the Regs. Is it an offence? Only if by failing to carry out the fra there is, as you correctly say, AS A RESULT, one or more persons at risk of serious injury or death in the event of fire. In most cases where an FRA has not been carried out, there is no such risk, ergo no offence for which the punter can be prosecuted. It is still, however, a breach, and would enter into the criminal arena if it were subject to an enforcement notice with which the punter then failed to comply. All this becomes much clearer if you stick to 15 year old malt, rather than port!
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"Even the venerable Times newspaper was long a hold-out for "ize" but apparently switched to "ise" overnight in the mid-1980s."
I believe that even the Oxford Dictionary allows a choice. I am amazed that you are not for choice Mr Todd.
Additionally, would you direct me to this 'decriminalisation of minor breaches'. I can find lots on Googlization about maraijuana and a bit of waffle from the Scottish Parliament but nothing that indicates that the British Government is advocating decriminalising legislation that they have just written, (or is that wrote)?
As for the malt... civil service pay old chap!
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Valery, First the rules on -ize. The original rule of the OED was that there was no choice if the word had a Greek route. It had, in such cases to be -ize. Alas, no one learns Greek any more, so no one knew how to apply the rule, and, as English language is a living organism, they changed their thinking so that the situation is now this. Where there is a choice, you can, as you say, use either, BUT the OED preferred spelling is the -ize version. You will find all the many thousands of British Standards that your civil service chums quote endlessly (often with little care -and sometimes understanding-of what the documents say in the first place) are all written solely with -ize endings, because BS 0 (a standard for standards) says you must use the OED style.
The decriminalization of minor breaches was a concept that your chums bandied about, in the heady days of Vicki Harris and Gerry Reid, in respect of the WFPL. The theory made perfect sense, and it was this. If you breach ANY condition specified in a fire certificate, you are committing an offence, for which you could be subject to prosecution, namely that of breaching a condition specified in a fire certifcate. This can be an entirely trivial breach, such as failing to keep a log book. But then you really have no excuse, as your friendly neighbourhood I/O has spent lots of his valuable time telling you exactly what to do via the medium of the fire certificate. Now along comes FRA and the WFPL, and suddenly the poor punter is cast adrift from his friendly I/O (like good ole Messey), who will no longer be holding his hand and sorting out his fire precautions for him. It was acknowledged that the poor punter will not get it as right as Messey (though he might do as well as CERTAIN of Messey's chums). so the idea was, if he gets it wrong, lets not give power to prosecute them for an offence UNLESS he is so damn stupid that he puts people at serious risk. What you now have in the RRO is just that principle carried over into the RRO, with less scope for defence if you put an employee (as opposed to a non-employee) at serious risk. As I recall, the 1993 Home Office report on the FP Act first introduced the concept, but I do not recall that it used the funny term decriminalization, but it said the same thing, and that was the term that people used for a while during the drafting of the WFPL.
On a personal note, try not to understand all this too well, as civil service policy is to move people to other Departments as soon as they know anything about the subject with which they are dealing, and we would all kind of miss you if that happened. You might end up fixing the gypsies, like Wee Marky Coram. ( Have any of them put a shotgun up his sit-upon yet, do you happen to know?)
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I must say, regardles of certain others recent interjections, that I am finding some of these threads "A most excellent journey". Great tuition, leading questions/statements, an illuminating read! Keep me going through the rigours of yuletide.
Thank-you! I was becoming demoralized.
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mr p - guffaw, guffaw!
dave bev
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Thanks for the explanation of 'breach of regs' and 'offence'. I remember being taught that we couldn't take enforcement action due to a lack of FRA as part of this FRS's WPR training (and then spent several years trying to convince many of my colleagues who obviously hadn't) but was never quite sure of the legal reason.
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Risk assessment
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On the second bit about charging...I think London are playing a bit of a dodgy game. In my view FRS should never carry out FRA, for money or otherwise. Why not go back to certification? There is also the concept of unfair trade, if FRS charges commercial rates then they are making excess profits because they are already levying a precept. If they undercut commercial rates they are dissing Colin and his colleagues. The whole issue of commercial trading by local autthorities is complex and liable to create conflicts of interests. London's engineering team should resign, set up a trading company and rent the space back from the LFEPA. (If I have got that all wrong, I apologise in advance...third glass of port)!
Essex Fire & Rescue trading as EFA (Trading) can now carry out risk assessments in a consultant capacity. They also sell an online FRA for £199. http://www.ictu.co.uk/
I think that this is an interesting interpretation of the duty to give information in Fire and Rescue Services Act 2004. Is it reasonable? Is anyone going to take them to court to find out?
If I was trying to run a business doing FRAs I don’t think I would be too happy about it. But the fact that Essex is charging a commercial rate is probably better than them providing the advice for nothing.
What does the Forum think about this?
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No problems with any competition on a level playing field.
But its not.
Marketing is the most critical element in running a successful business. If a Fire Authority uses its name as part of a commercial company then they are gaining a huge commercial advantage from the outset.
The commercial advantage they gain is both explicit and implicit- not only can you rely on the good guys in the red engines but as the fire authority is the enforcing authority they are not going find themselves wanting.
There plenty of history on this type of thing- look at the care industry, the failure of social services to regulate council run homes and the creation of the Care Standards commission. You cannot be gamekeeper and poacher. Having stayed in a number of hotels in the area with fire certificates I would not be too confident that consistent standards will be maintained either!
And is the business truly financially independent with all normal commercial overheads or are the local council tax payers subsidising the commercial clients?
I recently did a H&S course in a care home where a local fire authority business unit provide the fire training. I touched on fire safety matters and their evacuation procedures and was immediately countered by "Well the fire Brigade do our training so they must be right". Trouble is they were not. A crew commander with no fire safety background giving bad advice and all I can do is say well ask the fire safety department and they will put you right.
Of course for risk assessments the trading company is lkely to attract the blue chip clientele but the lower grade work and problem buildings are still more likely to use an independent assessor.
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The Workplace Regs have done very little to maintain standards so it is down to the RRO to save the day.
Instead of offering a service providing FRA a fire authority should be directing their resources to carrying out a robust inspection programme. Perhaps The Essex FA should learn to walk before they run.
The key to using an independent assessor is that they are free from influence from suppliers and the enforcing authority.
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It should be illegal for a brigade to undertake anything commercial (it certainly used to be - extinguisher maintenance depts could only service other government or similar premises like councils, education, universities and couldn't make profits) other than certain training services. If they are going to enforce they must be independant - would they really take enforcement action against a premises they'd commercially FRA'd? They will say so, but in reality.
Alternatively if they really want to become commercial, fine - take enforcement off them, which as they increasingly civilianise their inspection wing they might as well anyway.
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Being a bit wicked...I would love to see a Fire and Rescue Authority taking their own FRA consultants to Court under the RRO. Article 5 applies I think.
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The Workplace Regs have done very little to maintain standards so it is down to the RRO to save the day. .
I have to disagree with this its not the WPR fault its the employers and FRA.
the secret is not robust inspection programme to self complinace but robust enforcement
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I am not pointing the finger solely at the FP Wkplace Regs but more at the introduction of them. When introduced fire authorities were advised to proceed with a 'softly softly' approach. This gave some authorities the green light to place the regs on the 'back burner' so to speak.
Perhaps if Government had put more effort and money into advertising the FP Wkplace Regs there would have been a far better take-up by employers. That is however now water under the bridge we have to move on and that is why I have to rely on the RRO to pull it all together.
I totally agree with R.I. Skassessment FA's must include a robust enforcement programme. This is where I am still to be convinced and why. A client recently copied a FA letter he had received following an inspection that read 'That the fire authority were satisfied that The Fire Precautions (Workplace) Regulations were being complied with however the following matters require attention' A FIRE RISK ASSESSMENT SHOULD BE UNDERTAKEN.
Not a lot of progress in 8 years.
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Apologies for being picky but technically the letter is correct - the risk assessment is a requirement of the Management Regs - not the Workplace Regs
The letter would be incorrect if the legislation quoted was "The Workplace Fire Precautions Legislation" which encompasses both.
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I agree FA's should include a robust enforcement programme however this will not happen. The fire safety departments in FA have been decimated, by two thirds in the case I am familiar with. They talk about concentrating their efforts on high risk premises what about the other 95%. If you are placing your trust the responsible persons don't hold your breath. RRO will make no difference we are moving from proactive policies to reactive like the factory inspector did in the seventies, take them to court after the fire.
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would they really take enforcement action against a premises they'd commercially FRA'd? They will say so, but in reality.
The way that the RRO is designed allows for the use of an independant verifier of the RA. The FRS in the area may be asked to verify the RA, they cannot as far as I am aware carry out RA's on behalf of a client because of the enforcement issues mentioned above.. but in the verification process they effectivley get first bite.
If you go back a few years to when FRS's did the fire safety plans... they did specify the requirements.... many times I had the impression that I was being used as a free consultant designing the FS provisions for someone.... is there much difference between that and what some propose for the RRO.
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Risk assessment
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On the second bit about charging...I think London are playing a bit of a dodgy game. In my view FRS should never carry out FRA, for money or otherwise. Why not go back to certification? There is also the concept of unfair trade, if FRS charges commercial rates then they are making excess profits because they are already levying a precept. If they undercut commercial rates they are dissing Colin and his colleagues. The whole issue of commercial trading by local autthorities is complex and liable to create conflicts of interests. London's engineering team should resign, set up a trading company and rent the space back from the LFEPA. (If I have got that all wrong, I apologise in advance...third glass of port)!
Essex Fire & Rescue trading as EFA (Trading) can now carry out risk assessments in a consultant capacity. They also sell an online FRA for £199. http://www.ictu.co.uk/
I think that this is an interesting interpretation of the duty to give information in Fire and Rescue Services Act 2004. Is it reasonable? Is anyone going to take them to court to find out?
If I was trying to run a business doing FRAs I don’t think I would be too happy about it. But the fact that Essex is charging a commercial rate is probably better than them providing the advice for nothing.
What does the Forum think about this?
ODPM say that FRS are not allowed to carry out FRA's and they will be stamped upon if they try.
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I thought the deputy PM had a record of using his fists not his feet
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ODPM say that FRS are not allowed to carry out FRA's and they will be stamped upon if they try.
ODPM says they can't do the RA but they say that the company can ask the FRS to validate it..... one of the pains I had was trying to sort out a procedural policy to deal with that.... poacher and gamekeeper in one..........
On the point of should a FRS make money out of this.... why not.... running training courses to teach people how to complete a risk assessment is no different than fire extinguisher etc training and it helps steer people in the right direction.
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Bluefire 1
I am unclear what the verification or validation process that you mention actually is.
Unless a FRS actually goes to the premises and gathers information how can they verify the information that the FRA is based on?
I agree that they can look at a FRA (that has been sent to them) and make some comments about its content but this would be very general advice. They would not be in a position to formally verify or validate its contents.
The only way FRS can validate a FRA is to inspect the premises and gather information from the occupants. Is the ODPM suggesting that FRS should do this on request?
All sounds a bit dodgy to me.
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I think you will find that the FRS (those who aren't acting in way which will potentially bring them into a conflict of interest), will 'audit' a risk assessment process and outcomes and may well write a letter to the responsible person stating that at the time of that audit they appeared to be complying with the legislation.
As for the ODPM actually being brave enough to ban FRS from carrying out FRA, I somehow doubt that they would be so specific.
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Val has just about hit the nail on the head...... the FRS can be asked to assess the assessment against the criteria laid down in the RRFSO and against any plans provided. Their comments can only be based on what the assessment says, hence one of the big problems with the Order.
At the moment there are in place prescriptive codes..... take for example a travel distance 45m in 2 directions... that is fixed and the FSO can see immediately if there is a difference but under RA, if the assessment says 60m is safe because of xyz......... then how in reality can the FSO prove otherwise without undertaking a full inspection and maybe getting "expert" third party opinion (in the case of fire engineered solutions) on the RA so bias is not shown, and remember when it comes in, the owness will be on the FRS to prove that the RA doesn't work not on the owner/occ to prove it does.
At meetings I was in with the ODPM back in 2001 and 2002 when all this kicked off at policy level and the consultation was being readied, it was clear from what they were saying that yes inspections will have to be undertaken.
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Bluefire 1
I was under the impression that the burden of proving that x,y and z is reasonable lies with the resposible person.
Onus of proving limits of what is practicable or reasonably practicable
34. In any proceedings for an offence under this Order consisting of a failure to comply with a
duty or requirement so far as is practicable or so far as is reasonably practicable, it is for the
accused to prove that it was not practicable or reasonably practicable to do more than was in fact
done to satisfy the duty or requirement.
I have taken this to mean that 'clever dick' has to prove that 70m single direction of travel in an underground bunker past tinker burning off copper cables, provides an equivilant level of safety because a sand bucket has been provided.
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Val
The answer to your question lies in how the ODPM see the thing working. A few years ago I was fortunate (or is that unfortunate !) enough to be invited onto one of the working parties looking at enforcement principles. The way that they expected it to be done ran like this.........
Currently the FSO only has to look at a what is basically a fixed formula.... x exits - x travel distance - x directions - low/high risk ...... fill in the blanks and look up the answer in the codes/guides.
Under the RRFSO RA approach, the reponsible persom will assess the risk and come up with his figures and say safe or not. In the case you cite for example.....if he says that all persons are fit, there have been no occurances over the past 10 years and they have fire fighting measures in place albeit a bucket of sand and he considers the process low risk then he is happy with his assessment and considers all is well. If the FRS disagree and say that the travel distance is excessive, then they will have to detail why they think that is the case. They will have to evaluate the risk and the sytems in place and run a RA matrix to come up with what they consider to be the "real risk" and thus say that the travel distance in the persons RA is excessive.
In other words, the owness is on the FRS to prove that the RA done is invalid and that further control measures are required before it can be deemed acceptable. I may have been a little over the top by saying that the full burden of proof was with the FRS but I think you can see where I was coming from. The days of a scale rule and a table of travel distances will have been consigned to the bin.
As for Section 34, the resposible person has not failed to comply... he has done the RA as required by Section 9 and provided what he sees as a reasonable and practicable solution to satisfy Section 8 as well. If the case went to court, the FRS would again have a burden of proof in proving that the case was suitable to be tried as a breach of Sections 8 or 9, they would have to say to the court that he had not done all R&P and state the reasons why, (the days of it was 5 metres over distance or the fire door was wedged open have gone as straight proofs).... it would be imposible to stand up in court and offer no reason why the case was there and why the FRS disagreed with the persons statement of doing all R&P.... the person would then have to satisfy the court in his defence that what he had in place was R&P in other words the burden of proof now shifts to him.
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I have emailed the ODPM and asked them if FRS can carry out fire risk assessments. They replied that they can, but only in a "consultant capacity" by setting up a separate company (for example, EFA); who can charge for their services.
So there we are, it appears that FRS can do FRA as long as they set up a separate company. I suppose this is "modernisation".
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Steve, You are right, but what you weren't told is that the seperate company must be just that. A limited company, totally devoid of the Fire and Rescue Authority. The employees of the new company, if currently employed by the Fire and Rescue Authority must resign and take up employment with the new company. (Pension and everything, etc.) If that goes bust then you are out of a job.
I'm not really an expert but I understand that after campaigning for years for this sort of freedom not many Local Authorities have taken it up. When you get down to the nitty gritty it just doesn't look that attractive. I suspect that some senior personnel in Local Authorities, etc are keen to try anything to raise their profile.
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There is at least one FRS that is looking at that possibility, using ex FSO's as the staff.
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Well the current FSO's need something to do after being phased out by civilian inspectors on a fraction of the wage......
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AnthonyB
Now you have wound me up!
Take a look at the salaries on offer for consultants. Unless you have completed your time in a local authority FRS, got your pension and are therefore happy to undercut a portion of the market, there isn't much difference.
Maybe it is a fraction of the wage in the depressed areas around Sheffield....
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Val
I agree with Anthony B
The proof of the pudding is in the eating.
One brigade I know has already replaced 4 former ADO/ Stno FSO posts with non uniformed staff on £25k, they are looking to take on 4 more this time circa £20k. Done through natural wastage and restructure. (my old job was one of these).
And "in the depressed areas around Sheffield" - or generally I guess north of Watford- the real world is that these wage levels are considered pretty decent.
Whats the market for consultants? The big players target the blue chip companies and design consultants, they offer inflated salaries to young graduates, who perhaps can make the CFD model sing and dance but often have little contact with the real world in terms of the behaviour of fire and humans in concert. I quite often enjoy the odd one of these for breakfast.
But in the real world the bulk of the work in the private sector is in employers risk assessments and this is indeed a cut throat market. Theres plenty of work but on low margins - market forces rule here. And its not just because ex fire officers on a pension can under cut everybody else, its also because there are many large and small companies prepared to offer poor quality cut price risk assessments often based on a generic model that do often do not come anywhere near the definition of S&S.
I see the insurance companies and the threat of civil claims as a much stronger driver of compliance levels than fire authorities in the future, the way things are going.
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£20 & £25k for civilian FSO's is good - several I have seen advertised are only in the £11-£19k, meaning that some are being paid less than some parking ticket attendants!
From my experience private sector consultants are well paid in most companies
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As I recall, the 1993 Home Office report on the FP Act first introduced the concept, but I do not recall that it used the funny term decriminalization, but it said the same thing, and that was the term that people used for a while during the drafting of the WFPL.
Colin
The 97 FR(W) Regs were not drafted by the Home Office Fire Department dispite their report but by the HSE under the MHSW Regs with some members of the HO(FD) and CACFOA on the working party.. hence they go along with the usual 5 steps guidance of the HSW Act. The same happened with DSEAR and MSER.. HSE committees (such as HELA, HSG and PELG sub groups) with the DTI running close second and FRS running third... The HO(FD) was for the belt and braces approach but the need for the Gov to introduce the EC directives (which now include ATEX as well) forced them to bow to the RA way of doing things and eventually to ODPM pushing through (?) the RRFSO.... as they say... I know cos I was there and what a waste of time it was..
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Colin was talking about the HO consultation paper that predated the FP(W) Regs by a few years.
I've still got a copy somewhere. If I get bored I may look to see if it was driven by the EC or something else.
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I have just been told that the RR (Fire)O Guides have been published. 150 pages each but I can't find a link on the ODPM website. Can anybody help? Thanks.
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oops. Sorry, just found it. It is under Fire Safety Law. Lots of reading for everyone.
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I was very impressed today to hear the radio adverts for the RRO for the first time. WOW!! So different to the 97 launch of the wp regs. And one of my clients phoned to say they had received a letter from the Govt today.
Well impressed so far. Well done mr Bliar and co!!! For once it seems that fire safety matters!
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I was told that they also are going to do something nationally on TV and in the press!
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At the seminar I attended at Building Research in January, the ODPM Rep (as he was then) said that it was the intention of the Government to send leaflets about the changes in fire safety law to all parties likely to be affected as well as national advertising in the media. Any one had a leaflet yet?
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Yes one of my clients received one this week. Also radio adverts have been aired on classic FM this week
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A number of people have leaflets because we are giving them out on inspections, despite being private sector not fire authority.
I was impressed with the willingness of DCLG to aid anyone, even if not LA, who is publicising the law- I explained what we did and with a week received not a jiffy bag with half a dozen copies, but a whole bulk outer of the entry level leaflet free of charge