Clause 19 - Charging
Fire and Rescue Services Bill
2:30 pm
Mr Richard Younger-Ross (Shadow Minister, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister Local Government & the Regions; Teignbridge, Liberal Democrat)
That is not what the authorities and senior officers have advised us. They would like some flexibility to deal with the cases in which there is a continuously faulty fire alarm in a building, yet the owners take no action to put it right. Schemes might be introduced to ensure that such charges are not made, such as regular maintenance being carried out on the alarm. Of course the fire brigade would always attend if an alarm went off—the brigade would respond to that as normal—but if it repeatedly transpired that it was turning up and there was nothing but an alarm going off, with no smoke or fire in sight, the authority should be allowed to charge. I am not saying that it should charge; simply that it should be free to do so.