Fewer than a third of homes in fatal fires had alarms

FEWER than one third of the homes where people died in fires over the past two years had smoke alarms fitted, and it was not possible to say for certain if all of them were working.

In the rest of the cases where fatalities occurred, there were either definitely no alarms or it was not possible to tell if there had been an alarm.

Firefighter representatives said the figures show that the message about smoke alarms’ importance in the home was not getting through to the public.