Fire service criticised after person dies in blaze

A fire service has been criticised after a resident died in a house blaze while waiting for a safety visit, a watchdog has said.

Poor prevention work was one of "many issues" uncovered during a recent inspection of Devon and Somerset Fire and Rescue Service (DSFRS), which was also told to improve its culture and how it promotes diversity.

But, his Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services (HMICFRS) praised the service for how it dealt with emergencies, including major incidents.

Gavin Ellis, chief fire officer in Devon and Somerset, said preventing emergencies is a "huge focus" for the service, which had "already acted" on recommendations.

'Tragic consequences'

Inspectors highlighted particular concerns about fire prevention and a backlog of 7,000 home safety visits - up from 1,400 in 2021.

The HMICFRS report said the fire service told its inspectors it had "mostly cleared" the backlog but not before there were "tragic consequences".

"A fatal fire review revealed that despite historic engagement, the service hadn't made a home safety visit to an individual who was on the backlog list. Months later, before a visit was made, the occupant died in a fire," it added.

A spokesperson for the fire service told the BBC it visited the property involved in 2017 and 2018 and worked to make it safer while providing advice.

They added: "We received a further referral and made attempts to contact the individual, which were unsuccessful. We were due to try again when, sadly, the fatal fire happened. We review all fatal fires to learn about what we can do differently in the future."

During its inspection, the HMICFRS found the service was good at responding to fires, emergencies and major incidents and at understanding fire and risk.

It was deemed adequate at ensuring public safety through fire regulation and at managing resources and future affordability.

However, it required improvement in fire prevention, as well as how it promotes values and culture and matching the right people to the right skills.

Understaffed

While the service was praised for doing "considerable work" to improve its culture, some staff told inspectors they did not feel confident challenging inappropriate behaviour.

The service had also not made enough progress in its approach to equality, diversity and inclusion, the report added. It said inspectors were "disappointed" to find the diversity and inclusion team was "understaffed" and had an "excessive" workload.

His Majesty's Inspector Roy Wilsher said: "We were disappointed to find that the service hasn't made the progress we expected. For example, five areas for improvement that we highlighted during our previous inspections of the service still haven't been addressed.

"Overall, there is a clear commitment from staff and senior leaders to improve. The service is aware of the many issues we found and had plans in place to make improvements."

Alex Smith, Fire Brigades Union brigade chair for Devon and Somerset said the senior management team at the service were "putting their finders in their ears and ignoring the call to action".

He added that leaders "continue to model poor behaviour while failing to support firefighters who have experienced harassment, discrimination or bullying at work", and accused them of choosing to threaten to reduce retained firefighters' pay and change the shift patterns of wholetime staff".

"Devon and Somerset Fire and Rescue Service senior management must stop attacking the terms and conditions of their workforce and start actioning cultural change at the top," he added.

Work 'has been recognised'

Mr Ellis said the authority "welcomed the inspectorate's report, which is an important check-in against our improvement plans".

"It's great to see our emergency response praised. It's important for us that when people call 999, they get a good service.

"Operational colleagues across the service work hard every day to maintain cover and competency so that they're ready should anyone in our communities need them."

He said work to improve culture "has been recognised".

On the prevention of fires, Mr Ellis said the recommendations made were "process issues" and the service has "already acted" to better target its prevention work.

"Preventing emergencies is a huge focus for the organisation and our people are dedicated to keeping people safe," he said.

"Overall, we have a great foundation to keep on improving."