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Adam Bannister is a contributor to IFSEC Global, having been in the role of Editor from 2014 through to November 2019. Adam also had stints as a journalist at cybersecurity publication, The Daily Swig, and as Managing Editor at Dynamis Online Media Group.
The year 2017 was the year the government finally started listening to the fire industry’s countless recommendations for improving fire safety in the UK.
Inevitably, and tragically, it took the worst fire in living memory to focus minds.
Decades of falling fire deaths had bred complacency, but the events of 14 June changed everything.
Naturally, from June onwards, Grenfell, its aftermath and the myriad problems it has exposed (to the wider public – many in the fire industry were already aware of them) have been the main focus and among the most read articles.
With the Grenfell inquiry and Dame Judith Hackitt’s report on building regulations concluding next year, 2018 is sure to be momentous too. Let’s hope the authorities and all stakeholders in fire safety make the right choices to keep further tragedies to a minimum.
Merry Christmas from IFSEC Global and thank you for your support and input.
The shocking skills shortage in the fire industry in numbers Whether you blame a lack of formal qualifications, a UK culture that many think undervalues engineering as a profession, or New Labour’s obsession with boosting numbers of non-vocational university degrees, we’re reaching crisis point in engineering skills, as this FIA infographic demonstrated.
Grenfell: councils and social landlords have ignored our warnings for years
Hannah Mansell, Passive Fire Protection Forum chair and spokesperson for the BWF’s Fire Door Safety Week campaign, recounted the catalogue of fire safety failures she has witnessed in high rise buildings and how the industry’s warnings have fallen on “deaf ears”.
We suggested 10 of the most pressing questions that needed satisfactory answers if councils, the government, the construction industry and the fire sector could together prevent similar tragedies happening.
RIBA calls for repeal of fire safety order
Echoing the sentiments of October’s most read story, the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) called for The Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order (RRFSO) to be disposed of, and the “reintroduction of mandatory fire certificates for designated premises, based on independent inspections by the fire brigades.”
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Our most-read fire safety articles of 2017The year 2017 was the year the government finally started listening to the fire industry’s countless recommendations for improving fire […]
Adam Bannister
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