We promote, engage and enforce fire safety measures required by law to ensure buildings and occupants are protected in the event of a fire. We hold a statutory duty to enforce The Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 (as amended by the new Fire Safety Act). Our aim is to help Responsible Persons meet their legal obligations and help them protect their buildings and the people who use them from fire hazards.

We use a blended approach of operational crews and specialist members of our team to provide advice, support and education. We also investigate reports of poor fire safety practices and where necessary, take decisive enforcement action to limit or prohibit the use of buildings which do not comply with fire safety regulations.

Our Risk Based Intervention Programme uses data and information to ensure we focus our resources to premises that would present the greatest risk to occupants in the event of a fire. These can be deemed higher risk due to the complexity of the building, or due to the occupants within it.

We continue to work with our trusted partners such as Trading Standards, Environmental Health, Care Quality Commission and Local Authority housing and planning teams to ensure safety measures seamlessly integrate into building design and usage from the earliest stages possible.

Not attending a greater proportion of false alarms means that fire engines will be available more often to respond to genuine incidents. It also reduces the risk to the public if fewer fire engines travel at high speed on the roads to respond to these requests. Although the procedures we introduced in the last CRMP have reduced these types of incidents, we would like to reduce them further. Through this CRMP we will look to extend our current arrangements of not attending fire alarm actuations at commercial premises without a sleeping risk to 24 hours.

Our approach aims to save lives, continue to reduce false alarms, and mitigate the considerable impact fires can have on communities.

Staff across the service are involved in protection activity. We have provided training for
operational crews to a Level 3 in fire safety auditing and use these staff to support the lower risk audits throughout the county.

Our regulatory activity (fire safety inspections) increased by over 2% in 2024/25 compared to the previous year. Our newly implemented Risk Based Intervention Programme will ensure that activity is directed at our highest risk premises.

Our statutory and nonstatutory consultations increased by over 18% in 2024/25. Our response to building consultations and licensing consultations, within the allocated timeframe is 100% and 99% respectively.

We saw a dramatic increase in guidance and advice, with an increase of over 800% in
2024/25 compared with the  previous year. This is primarily down to legislative changes
impacting the tourism sector across our service area.

Our engagement with businesses following false alarms increased by 84% in 2024/25, in line with changes we have made to policy.

We have maintained and refreshed our three Primary Authority Schemes, ensuring consistent fire safety advice and guidance for businesses we service both locally and nationally. This reduces duplication of effort for both businesses and fire services, as one agreed approach can be applied nationally, saving time and resources.

Our Achievements

• We allocate our intervention visits through the Risk Based Intervention Programme (RBIP) to ensure we visit buildings that present the greatest risk.
• We have introduced a specialist out of hours provision to enforce fire safety legislation at any time of day.
• We have developed key performance and evaluation indicators to clearly demonstrate performance, which we monitor through our governance groups.
• We have aligned our Protection work to the National Fire Standards relating to Protection.
• We have created and developed a succession plan for specialist roles to ensure training and support is provided to allow staff to reach their potential and better service the needs of North Yorkshire and the city of York.
• We have developed the Protection quality assurance framework to ensure staff are delivering to the correct standard and that there is a consistent approach across the Service.
• We have used new and innovative data sources and information to deliver the Protection Strategy with increased efficiency and effectiveness.
• We have refreshed our Primary Authority Schemes, ensuring consistent fire safety advice and guidance for businesses we service both locally and nationally.
• We responded to a high number of Fire Safety concerns to help keep people safe in areas of high tourism

Areas of Focus

Over the period of this CRMP we will focus on:

• Ensuring we meet the requirements of our Risk Based Intervention Programme. We will visit all our known high-risk premises within a rolling three-year period, in line with national guidance.
• Maintaining our impressive response rate to building consultations and licensing consultations.
• Enhancing community resilience by carrying out business engagement initiatives at buildings of high community value.
• Continuing to reduce the number of false alarms we attend. This will include extending our current arrangements of not attending fire alarm actuations at commercial premises without a sleeping risk to 24 hours.
• Aligning to changes and emerging new legislative requirements and national frameworks.
•  ontinued support for the government’s acceleration remediation plans following the Grenfell Tower tragedy.
•  Continued accredited protection training for our operational staff to make sure our biggest resource can engage effectively with our business communities.
•  Carrying out appropriate post incident engagement activity in commercial premises to reduce risk.
• Identifying and managing emerging risks including new technologies.
• Developing collaborative opportunities.
•  Widening the triggers for the attendance of fire investigation officers at incidents, to enhance the understanding of fire causation and ensure continued alignment with the National Fire Investigation Standard.
• Using the powers of legal enforcement and prosecution available to us where this is appropriate, to ensure public safety in a fair, equitable and consistent manner in line with the Enforcement Concordat.
• We will ensure our prevention and protection teams work together to provide a collaborative and inclusive approach to interventions.

You can read our Protection Strategy on our website www.northyorksfire.gov.uk/about-us/
who-and-what/strategies-policies-and-procedures/