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SUSPENDED SENTENCE FOR GUILTY FIRE RISK ASSESSOR

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SUSPENDED SENTENCE FOR GUILTY FIRE RISK ASSESSOR

Post by hammer1 »

https://www.ioshmagazine.com/2021/06/29 ... assessor-0

This does get me worried a bit, obviously we cannot comment specifically on this as don't know the full details, but would love to see full transcript.

What is the line between the definition of 'honest mistake' and intention to cause risk to life in a court of law? We are all human, sometimes we can only go on what the RP states which can be little if nothing in regards to information. How many times have we faced locked doors, ceilings to high unless we had a ladder? This is when Article 5 kicks in big time.... a lot of consultants caveat the hell out of FRA templates and to contracts to the degree they become useless and does nothing to assist the RP in reducing risk.

Does this push the assessor away from being intrusive? Does a simple scope of work to caveat only a visual walk round will be completed now to adhere to minimum standards?

The person was 3rd party accredited, accredited in other areas of fire safety, unless we know the full facts should we automatically jump to conclusions? We can only hope the FRS have the right intentions on this and it was done in the public interest? Who knows?

Food for thought though for all who conduct FRAs out there....
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Re: SUSPENDED SENTENCE FOR GUILTY FIRE RISK ASSESSOR

Post by witsd »

It's interesting...

The article says that all these penetrations were discovered by the FRS, but doesn't explicitly say that the assessor missed / dismissed them. To be honest, it's so light on actual facts as to be useless to any other assessors. Did the FRA state that it was a type 1? Did it mention the risers at all - were they locked and inaccessible or just ignored?

At one extreme this would be insanely harsh to the assessor. At the other, I think all of us would be happy to see them metaphorically hang. I assume it's probably somewhere in the middle, but we will likely never really know.

What I will say is that it's (probably) yet another example of why 3rd party accreditation is a load of tosh, and shouldn't be seen as any kind of guidance at all.

Oh, and one final thought: What is the actual risk to life from fire within the common areas of a three-story building? I can't think of the last death to occur in such a space in the UK...
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Re: SUSPENDED SENTENCE FOR GUILTY FIRE RISK ASSESSOR

Post by bernicarey »

There's far too many people out there with 3rd part accreditation of letters after their name which don't really mean anything.
I have a client who had such an individual in to assess their properties a couple of years ago.

The individual did not provide a FRA as such; because the RRFSO states at S9:
(6) As soon as practicable after the assessment is made or reviewed, the responsible person must record the information prescribed by paragraph (7) where—

(a)he employs five or more employees;
(b)a licence under an enactment is in force in relation to the premises; or
(c)an alterations notice requiring this is in force in relation to the premises.

(7) The prescribed information is—

(a)the significant findings of the assessment,
including the measures which have been or will be taken by the responsible person pursuant to this Order; and
(b)any group of persons identified by the assessment as being especially at risk.
What they provided was a list of the 'significant findings', which in some cases was 'There are no significant findings'.....

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Re: SUSPENDED SENTENCE FOR GUILTY FIRE RISK ASSESSOR

Post by witsd »

A bit of a case of Chinese whispers, but I've heard that a) the FRA wasn't particularly bad, but the judge instructed the jury to find the assessor guilty if they didn't plead guilty, promising a much-attenuated sentence which then didn't really happen, and b) There was possibly a significant conflict of interests, with some member of the prosecuting fire authority running their own fire risk assessment business which was in direct competition with UK Fire Consulting Ltd.

I cannot comment on how reliable this information may be.
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Re: SUSPENDED SENTENCE FOR GUILTY FIRE RISK ASSESSOR

Post by Messy »

I have to say, a suspended prison sentence for missing fire stopping in a 3 storey block of flats seems really harsh when compared with other cases.

Maybe the judiciary have had the nod from somewhere to kick bottoms very hard in these cases due to Grenfell.

As wltsd is suggesting, perhaps there's much more to this than has been reported in that woefully inadequate piece of journalism. After all, in my experience, not many fire and rescue services would prosecute this. In fact there's a very high bar for prosecutions as if the cash strapped enforcement authority loses, they pay the costs and that can add up

I have definitely carried out FRAs where I have not been granted full access to all rooms, risers and service voids and expect to again. My last FRA was on a huge 144,000m2 building over 14 floors including several basements and hundreds of rooms. Did I see all parts of that building? No, but I did focus on means of escape and separation as like the flats in this story, there is a stay put angle to the evacuation strategy here as in a phased evacuation which obviously relies on fire spread being limited by fire walls and doors etc
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Re: SUSPENDED SENTENCE FOR GUILTY FIRE RISK ASSESSOR

Post by hammer1 »

witsd wrote: Thu Jul 01, 2021 5:36 pm A bit of a case of Chinese whispers, but I've heard that a) the FRA wasn't particularly bad, but the judge instructed the jury to find the assessor guilty if they didn't plead guilty, promising a much-attenuated sentence which then didn't really happen, and b) There was possibly a significant conflict of interests, with some member of the prosecuting fire authority running their own fire risk assessment business which was in direct competition with UK Fire Consulting Ltd.

I cannot comment on how reliable this information may be.
I liaise with IOs all the time and am sad to say 99% are woefully incompetent/lack experience and knowledge, this mainly falls down to lack of resources and lack of funding which needs addressing ASAP. A good few have moved over into consultancy or both which is a massive conflict of interest.
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Re: SUSPENDED SENTENCE FOR GUILTY FIRE RISK ASSESSOR

Post by 1804 »

Hi

Messy old boy

see below for fuller report

cheers

https://www.hantsfire.gov.uk/fire-servi ... ton-block/
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Re: SUSPENDED SENTENCE FOR GUILTY FIRE RISK ASSESSOR

Post by Alexis »

1804 wrote: Fri Aug 27, 2021 10:40 am Hi

Messy old boy

see below for fuller report

cheers

https://www.hantsfire.gov.uk/fire-servi ... ton-block/
Welcome and thank you for this 1804. :D
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Re: SUSPENDED SENTENCE FOR GUILTY FIRE RISK ASSESSOR

Post by Messy »

I am still unclear and wish further details could be published

Unless people like me (who complete FRAs) get full details of what Mr Morgan has done, what use is the press release other than a F&RS banging their own self congratulatory drum. It is such a waste of an opportunity to educate the public, businesses and fire safety professionals

But a suspended sentence is a serious award so I suspect (hope) there was more to this case than reported here.


Its the same with fire investigations. Huge resources are ploughed into investigating fires, but only a few of the larger incidents are reported fully. If more details were provided, it would create a pool of information for the public, businesses, academic researchers, those compiling training presentations and those involve in FRAs to access and learn from
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Re: SUSPENDED SENTENCE FOR GUILTY FIRE RISK ASSESSOR

Post by 1804 »

But don't you find it is the same when the HSE give out press releases? You get the offence, the name of the guilty party, the fine/jail term and then a smug HSE inspector saying that this could have been avoided. It's like the end of He-Man.
I reckon that all enforcing agencies give out similar types of press releases. Unless you can track down the transcript of the court proceedings which would be incredibly difficult in a lower court, we will not be told the full details. If it was in a higher court then the details may be available on BAILLI but otherwise we will have to keep guessing.
And thanks Alexis. Was on the forum a while back but had to take time away - fractured a bone in my spine.T12, which is one of the lowest loadbearing ones and it was a vertical fracture so remained loadbearing - if the fracture had been horizontal it would have been wheelchair from then on as it would have sheared into the spinal cord. Luckily I am still walking - my back is now actually stronger that it was before - as a nice surgeon at the Royal London put lots of titanium screws and plates in my back so now I am back to work too. Really lucky. Shame it didn't happen at work - then my claim would have been reported in SHP, but what are you gonna do?
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Re: SUSPENDED SENTENCE FOR GUILTY FIRE RISK ASSESSOR

Post by Alexis »

1804 wrote: Fri Aug 27, 2021 2:17 pm But don't you find it is the same when the HSE give out press releases? You get the offence, the name of the guilty party, the fine/jail term and then a smug HSE inspector saying that this could have been avoided. It's like the end of He-Man.
I reckon that all enforcing agencies give out similar types of press releases. Unless you can track down the transcript of the court proceedings which would be incredibly difficult in a lower court, we will not be told the full details. If it was in a higher court then the details may be available on BAILLI but otherwise we will have to keep guessing.
And thanks Alexis. Was on the forum a while back but had to take time away - fractured a bone in my spine.T12, which is one of the lowest loadbearing ones and it was a vertical fracture so remained loadbearing - if the fracture had been horizontal it would have been wheelchair from then on as it would have sheared into the spinal cord. Luckily I am still walking - my back is now actually stronger that it was before - as a nice surgeon at the Royal London put lots of titanium screws and plates in my back so now I am back to work too. Really lucky. Shame it didn't happen at work - then my claim would have been reported in SHP, but what are you gonna do?
Hi 1804 and welcome back to the fold. .cheers

So sorry to hear about your back. Really pleased to hear the operation was successful. ./thumbsup..

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Re: SUSPENDED SENTENCE FOR GUILTY FIRE RISK ASSESSOR

Post by 1804 »

Thanks Alex is
As always, very generous
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