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Fire service reminds building owners of their obligations under Building Safety Act 2022 after care operator fined £124,000
East Sussex Fire and Rescue Service has reminded building owners of their duties under the Building Safety Act 2022 after the directors of a care company were fined £124,000.
Thuraisamy Ravichandran, director and company secretary, and Radha Ravichandran, director, of Care Pro (South East) Limited pleaded guilty to all 12 offences at Brighton Magistrates’ Court in April, and sentencing was carried out earlier this month.
East Sussex Fire and Rescue Service’s fire-safety inspection officers visited Park Apartments at 14 Egerton Road in Bexhill-on-Sea on more than one occasion between 31 October and 3 November 2022.
The 12 offences identified included multiple failures for fire-fighting and fire detection, duty to take general fire precautions and risk assessment, as well as one failure to discharge maintenance duties.
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The change to the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 introduced by the Building Safety Act 2022 requires all responsible persons to carry out and record a fire risk assessment that considers the risks from fire to all persons legally on or in the vicinity of the premises.
The requirements apply to all non-domestic premises, such as where people work, visit or stay, including workplaces and the non-domestic parts of multi-occupied residential buildings, such as communal corridors, stairways and plant rooms.
In summary, district judge Teresa Szagun, when considering the prosecution sentencing guidelines, upheld culpability to be high and the level of harm to be medium.
In her judgement, she explained that the number of vulnerable residents placed at risk due to the defective fire doors and lack of detection and alarms raised the level of harm.
Judge Szagun added that the owners should have taken the time to understand published regulations and guidance when providing this type of service.
The defendants were fined £27,500 per offence for four of the offences, with guilty charges upheld for the remaining offences but no separate penalty awarded. This resulted in a £110,000 fine, a £2,000 victim surcharge and £12,455 for time and costs.
Care Pro (South East) Limited has not responded to a request for comment.
George O’Reilly, head of fire safety at East Sussex Fire and Rescue Service (ESFRS), said: “I would like to thank the court for their time and deliberations in this matter, as well as my legal team and staff for their efforts in bringing this case to a successful conclusion. ESFRS are legally required to enforce the requirements of the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005.
“We take this responsibility seriously and we will not hesitate to take legal action against anyone responsible for placing people at risk of death or injury from fire due to their failures to meet the requirements of this legislation.”
Craig Williams, the service’s group protection legislation and enforcement manager, said the case was one of the most serious it had ever prosecuted.
“The fine handed down by the court today reflects the serious nature of the offences,” he said.
“Owners and those responsible for any premises where the fire service find fire-safety contraventions are reminded of the potential consequences, including unlimited fines and potential custodial sentences.”
This case comes after the government won the first legal action it brought under new building safety legislation against the freeholder of a 16-storey tower block over unsafe cladding.
A first-tier tribunal has ordered Grey GR, the freeholder of Vista Tower in Stevenage, to fix the building within a legally mandated time frame.
The order was not made to recover government funding, which will remain in place to cover the works.
The case was the first legal action brought by the government under powers introduced in the Building Safety Act 2022.
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