Dumfries and Galloway Tourism

[Alan Keith]

The current situation regarding Fire Risk Assessment is causing grave concern. Various meetings and discussions have been held over the last few weeks including one with Chief Fire Officer, David Wynne and later with Area Manager Norrie Davies in company of Jackie Connelly of Dumfries & Galloway Council Building Control Department . Planning department and Rates assessment have also been contacted to determine how small accommodation providers are affected. The situation is perhaps best explained by reference to an email sent to tourism minister Jim Mather MSP which is copied below:.

Dear Jim

I know that Alex Fergusson has written to you on my behalf, but wished also to contact you myself about this most serious matter of the new fire safety legislation. I have spend a considerable amount of time researching the situation before raising the matter to ensure my facts are correct and the effects I have predicted are genuinely serious. I apologise for the length of this explanation, but the devil is in the detail, and it is important to identify it.

I fear that unless swift and decisive action is taken to place on hold the Fire Services' programme of auditing premises of B&Bs, their actions are likely to precipitate closure of a significant number of those. To explain further, it should be appreciated that around 1200 B&Bs in Scotland have 3 rooms or less (maximum 6 bed-spaces), a level of provision previously allowing them to operate legitimately from their home (classed as a dwelling under the terms of Scottish Building Regulations). In 2006 a change to those regulations reducing that number to 4 bed-spaces, with an additional proviso that operation only for 6 months in a year was introduced, apparently without consultation or publicity. Consequently, approximately 45% of Scotland's B&Bs are almost certainly operating (strictly speaking) illegally in terms of Building Regulations. In itself this has not caused a problem as local authorities (rightly) do not attempt to enforce such legislation, and only when a provider has a requirement to make a notifiable alteration to his house do the new rules come into play.

With the onset of the Fire (Scotland) Act 2005 and subsequent legislation, however, the actions of the Fire Service in auditing accommodation providers and the manner of their interpretation of the act and the associated guidance information, is compounding the problem. B&Bs are being visited by Fire Service staff to audit the risk assessments that they are obliged by law to carry out, and are invariably advising them that their property has inadequate levels of safety due to absence of fire doors, hard-wired smoke alarms to most rooms in their house and other matters. The letters being received by providers are also threatening in tone and give them 28 days to confirm they will agree to put the required alterations (or suitable alternatives) in hand. They are told that they have a year to actually do so. I can tell you that many providers are reacting angrily to this and at least initially refusing to comply with what is specified.

These prescriptions for fire doors and detectors in bedrooms are based on Building Regulations applicable to what is defined as a "residential building", i.e. a property that prior to 2006 would have had more that 6 letting bed-spaces and would have required a fire certificate. The guidance for small premises providing sleeping accommodation issued by the Scottish Government is at pains to state that the prescriptions referred to within the document are to be taken as "benchmarks" only and that the business operator is best qualified to assess the risk. Despite this, no information is given that would support the judgement of such an operator that the problem-causing prescriptions are unnecessary, and from our feedback locally, the Fire Department staff invariably cite them as essential. When this happens, due to the fact that fitting fire doors is classed as a notifiable alteration, a building warrant becomes obligatory. Application for that will now reveal that the building in question (if it has over 4 bed-spaces and is open more than half a year) requires the warrant to cover conversion of the dwelling to a residential building, invoking alteration covering disability legislation, insulation values etc. Although the local authority may waive some of these requirements at their discretion, this is not guaranteed, and B&Bs may suffer even greater financial penalty. Although it is difficult to provide accurate estimates, a typical cost to supply & fit say 6 fire doors and a fire detection system with be around £2500 - £3000 minimum, much more in some cases. This represents more that the annual profit for many operators

I would point out that although the reason behind the new law is to ensure safety of people staying in such premises, there is no evidence that any significant risk in the context of B&Bs ever existed. The Fire Service have over the years apparently failed to collect, or at least analyse, statistical data on fires that would enable them to differentiate between different types of provider, so they are unable to assess comparative risk between, for example, hotels, guesthouses, B&Bs or hostels. Despite the fact that the strategic enforcement guidance given to the Fire Authorities states that they should carry out their audit on a "risk-based methodology", and that this should be "open to scrutiny by others" the evidence is that no such work has been carried out. My request for the Dumfries & Galloway Fire Authority's Integrated Risk Management Plan (IRMP) resulted only in the supply of a glossy brochure publicising the service, but with no relevant risk data.

Based on empirical analysis (and in the absence of any relevant statistical data), I believe that the level of risk presented by these small providers is in fact much lower that either a larger provider, such as a hotel or even a purely domestic private house. Hotels invariably have paid employees who can never have quite the same degree of ownership or responsibility as an owner. They have less control over their customers as they cannot, refuse a guest because they are not happy about the person as a B&B still legally can. B&Bs are invariably now non-smoking and all owners have a strong ethic of duty of care to their guests. The probability of a B&B owner returning home drunk and falling asleep in bed while smoking, a common cause of fires in dwellings, is negligibly small. The level of maintenance of a B&B is generally higher that that of the average domestic residence. Consequently, the standard of construction currently required for a domestic dwelling would appear to be quite appropriate for a B&B. That standard would not require fire doors or smoke detectors in bedrooms (only in corridors and lobbies on each floor). It should also be kept in mind that nothing can ever reduce a risk to zero, only to an acceptably low value, which I believe is already present in reality.

I believe that the main problem could be solved by a revision to the guidance documents, for the law itself is quite broadly stated and makes no reference to technicalities. Indeed, it may be that if tested in court the prescriptions being demanded by the Fire Service might well be overthrown, but it is quite wrong that small businesses should have to fight to prove this in court. If action is not taken to hold back the Fire Service while a further investigation is made, I can assure you that many B&Bs are likely to give up rather than suffer the costs and inconvenience of taking up carpets and floors to wire in fire detection systems throughout their house and replace doors with fire doors. Also, many B&Bs are houses of character, enjoyed by guests (and owners) for their period charm. Ripping out solid Victorian doors to replace them with modern equivalents will destroy that character and many owners would rather give up than do that (Few B&B owners are dependant solely on the business). The loss to Scotland of many of such excellent and unique establishments can only be harmful.

With regard to the 2006 changes to the Building Regulation, I am at a loss to understand why this was done, and reverting to the earlier standard would be a good idea. However, if the need for alterations such as the provision of fire doors can be avoided under a revised risk assessment, that alone would allow owners time to comply with the updated regulations without undue pressure and would mitigate the worst of the problem.

The above deals with the effects on small serviced providers, but an even more serious problem results to providers of self-catering properties caught with the same legislation. It appears that same benchmarks are thought appropriate for such premises, e.g. fire doors and smoke alarms in bedrooms etc. It is unlikely that any of the thousands of such properties throughout Scotland will presently conform to these requirements as their level of construction in terms of building regulations is that of a dwelling. Bizarrely, during my initial discussions with the local fire chief it was stated that self-catering was being treated differently and that the there would be no requirement for fire doors etc., but within 2 days I received an email countermanding that advice and confirming that the same rules would apply to self-catering premises as for B&Bs etc. Certainly the guidance information does not differentiate between the two. I would put forward the same argument for relaxation here as for B&Bs, as people are simply using the building as their temporary home and the accommodation will indeed be better protected and maintained as the average family house.

Small accommodation providers provide an important service to tourism for meagre returns and have suffered badly in recent years with the destruction of Area Tourist Boards, the failure of VisitScotland to provide adequate support, the damaging effects of the visitscotland.com PPP and growing pressure of unwanted bureaucracy and legislation. For many this latest problem will be seen as the last straw unless something is done quickly. The consequence to Scotland's tourism industry is obvious

Alan Keith (Chairman)
Association of Dumfries & Galloway Accommodation Providers Airds Farm Crossmichael CASTLE DOUGLAS DG7 3BG 01556 670418 www.visitsouthwestscotland.com www.reclaimvs.com