New fire standards launched in England

by Breaking NewsSafety

The Fire Standards Board has launched a new professional standard for fire and rescue services in England, it’s ninth such professional standard.

The Safeguarding Fire Standard aims to ensure that fire and rescue services are doing all that they can to support safeguarding. Its desired outcome is that services work proactively to promote the safeguarding of those within their communities as well as employees and volunteers, reducing the risk of abuse, harm, and neglect.  

The Safeguarding Fire Standard outlines what a fire and rescue service must and should do to achieve the standard.

The standard states that a service must have a designated Safeguarding Lead, and that it should work collaboratively with partners to share learning and experiences to contribute to the continual improvement of safeguarding. Full details of what services need to do to achieve this standard are detailed in the How to Achieve section of the standard.  

Lord Greenhalgh, Fire Minister said: “…Fire and rescue service staff play a vital part in protecting communities and it’s crucial that they use the tools at their disposal to do so.” 

Whilst it is not mandatory for services to comply with the Fire Standards, the National Fire Framework makes clear that services are expected to pay due regard to Fire Standards as will the HMICFRS in their inspections.

The Fire Standards Board are confident that in many cases services are already achieving the outcomes which are the foundation of each Fire Standard. Where they are not, they accept services will need to implement any changes to enable them to achieve the standards in a way that fits with their strategic planning, improvement work and timetable. 

This is the ninth professional Fire Standard and aims to help drive continuous improvement across England’s fire and rescue services. 

The Fire Standards Board published eight standards in 2021. These are on:

  • Emergency response driving,
  • Operational preparedness,
  • Operational competence,
  • Operational learning, and
  • Code of Ethics
  • Community Risk Management Planning
  • Prevention
  • Protection

C-TEC’s CAST and Hush Pro systems specified at mixed-use site

by Projects

C-TEC’s CAST and Hush Pro fire alarm systems are safeguarding a charming cluster of commercial and residential properties in Llangollen, Wales.

As a ‘mixed-use’ building housing both business units and domestic dwellings, a combination of commercial and residential fire systems was required. Allied Fire & Escapes Ltd, a leading Wrexham-based fire specialist company, installed one of C-TEC’s powerful CAST XFP addressable fire systems to protect the ground floor retail units and interfaced it to three of C-TEC’s new Hush Pro domestic fire systems to safeguard the residential dwellings on the first floor.

Said John Westerman, Director at Allied: “Linking C-TEC’s CAST system to Hush Pro proved the ideal solution for this mixed-use building. Each domestic dwelling is fitted with a Hush Pro controller connected to a series of Hush Pro smoke detectors, base sounders and heat detectors – all interfaced via Hush Pro’s CAST Landlord Interfaces – to the CAST XFP communal/landlord system.”

Specifically designed for flats, apartments and high-rise residential buildings, Hush Pro provides residents with easy-to-use detection, alarm, silencing and test facilities so they can test their own devices, be alerted to system faults and hush any false alarms at the Hush Button which is positioned at light-switch level for easy access.

Said John: “We specified Hush Pro as it offers higher levels of fire protection over the Grade D unmonitored battery alarm systems typically used in domestic installations. As a fully-monitored BS 5839-6 Grade C system, Hush Pro reports open and short circuit faults and operation faults back to the CAST fire panel and even allows management and maintenance companies to remotely monitor the system. In the event of an emergency, Hush Pro relays information to the CAST panel to effectively notify building management.”

“As an intelligent domestic detection system, Hush Pro certainly ticks all the boxes. We were very impressed by its operation and ease of integration with the CAST fire system which was also simple and straightforward to set up. With regards to customer support, C-TEC is always very responsive and happy to help with any enquiries we have. We look forward to installing C-TEC’s products into our future contracts as they provide high-quality, intuitive and easy-to-install fire detection solutions that can be adapted to meet the specific requirements of any building.”

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