HC Deb 22 July 1975 vol 896 cc129-30W
Mr. English

asked the Secretary of State for Social Services when the report of the committee of inquiry set up to investigate the circumstances of the fire on 15th December 1974 at Fairfield Old People's Home, Edwalton, Nottinghamshire, is to be published; and whether she will make a statement.

Mrs. Castle

The committee of inquiry's report has been published today as a Command Paper (Cmnd. 6149). Copies are available in the Vote Office. I should like to pay tribute to the committee under the chairmanship of Mr. K. G. Jupp, MC, QC, for the thorough and expeditious manner in which it carried out the inquiry and for the impressively clear and balanced report it has produced.

The committee concluded that the death of 18 people at Fairfield could not be ascribed to any single cause. It found that the fire was started by smoking in a bedroom but that the coincidence of a number of factors was necessary for its rapid and fatal spread through the building. My officers are urgently reviewing the content and scope of building design guidance for new buildings, and of advice on measures to reduce fire risks in existing homes, particularly where the method of construction has resulted in extensive voids in the roof space or other parts of the structure, to take account of the conclusions of the committee. My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary will be consulted about the preparation of a comprehensive code of guidance on fire precautions for residential homes. But, as the committee itself argues convincingly, we must not, in our anxiety to reduce the risk of fire, create an institutional atmosphere in such homes either by the nature of the physical precautions or by arbitrary imposition of restricting and humiliating rules on the residents; and we cannot insist on standards of safety the cost of which we cannot afford to meet. In the last resort, there will always be some degree of risk.

The report will, I believe, be helpful not only to the Nottinghamshire County Council but to all who are concerned with the provision of residential homes, or other premises which may be subject to similar fire risks, and to local authorities not only as social services authorities but also as fire authorities. The committee's conclusions have been brought to their attention.