Fire Brigades Union Criticises Guidelines on Evacuating High-Rise Buildings

• Content
• News
• Fire Brigades Union Criticises Guidelines on Evacuating High-Rise Buildings

15 March 2024

A new document from the Home Office which outlines new evacuation strategies from high-rise residential buildings has been described as “too little….too late” by a firefighters’ union.

The guidance was developed in response to a Grenfell Tower Inquiry recommendation 33.22a : “That the government develop national guidelines for carrying out partial or total evacuations of high-rise residential buildings, such guidelines to include the means of protecting fire exit routes and procedures for evacuating persons who are unable to use the stairs in an emergency, or who may require assistance (such as disabled people, those with cognitive impairment, older people and young children).”

The document includes nine guidelines, recommended by the inquiry’s technical Steering Group, a joint Home Office and the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities group.

The Grenfell Tower Inquiry made the initial recommendation in October 2019, and the guidance was published in February 2024. Fire Brigades Union leader Matt Wrack has called it a “disgrace” that it had taken so long and described the guidance as containing “little of real substance”. 

“The Grenfell Tower fire was a tragedy created by politicians and big business. For decades, the profits of developers were prioritised over human life. Cutting corners on regulation, funding and firefighters’ health and safety will not keep people safe."

–Matt Wrack

General Secretary, Fire Brigades Union

In a letter to Home Secretary James Cleverly, Matt outlines his concerns, which include that the guidance was based on live tests of an evacuation conducted by the London Fire Brigade (LFB) and the National Fire Chiefs’ Council (NFCC), but these did not take place on anything like the scale of Grenfell Tower. They also did not use smoke.

Matt also raised that these live tests do not address worst-case scenarios where the whole building fails with only a single narrow stairwell, no alert system, no data on vulnerable residents, no evacuation lift, failed fire doors and other failures.

Commenting on his letter, Matt said: "This evacuation guidance is too little and too late. Nearly seven years on since the Grenfell Tower fire disaster, very little has changed on the regulations covering this critical area of safety.

“The Home Office has left residents in high-rise flats vulnerable to a repeat of the Grenfell Fire tragedy. Ministers have engaged in what looks like a tick-box exercise to evacuation guidelines for people’s homes.

“The Grenfell Tower fire was a tragedy created by politicians and big business. For decades, the profits of developers were prioritised over human life. Cutting corners on regulation, funding and firefighters’ health and safety will not keep people safe.

"It may only be a matter of time before we face another tragedy, unless there is a dramatic policy shift. Ministers must wake up, and listen to the voices of firefighters and residents.”

Picture: a photograph showing a banner which says "Grenfell Never Again". Image Credit: Adobe Stock

Article written by Ella Tansley | Published 15 March 2024

Share

Related Articles