Contribution by: Christine Lawson

Comment by: Christine Lawson

Focus area: Fire safety regulation

Regulator concerned: My comments are general and do not relate to a particular regulator or regulatory function

Comment:
I chair the Board of Trustees for our local Community centre. We are all volunteers. If we did not have the help of the Village Halls Association many other Boards like ours would be struggling. Fortunately I received training as a Health and Safety Adviser and a Risk Assessor which gave me the working knowledge that was needed to compile our first Fire Risk Assessment. If there was simple template for a Fire Risk Assessment that could be downloaded from the Internet that is available from either the local Fire service or ACRE/the Vilage Halls Association would be most helpful. No two buildings are the same and have different problems and usage. What would be very helpful would be if we could have free advice from the local Fire Prevention Service as to the viability of the Fire Risk Assessments that have been carried out. It’s knowing that we are as good as we can be with the precautions that we have taken with our buildings for our all Users would be extremely reassuring.