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NFRS 2023 69 - Hoarding

You asked for

This is a request for information under the Freedom of Information Act 2000. My request relates to the number of incidents in which ‘hoarding’ played a part.

For avoidance of doubt, we are defining hoarding as the accumulation of possessions in one’s home, often to an extreme and impractical degree.

  1. In the last 5 years, how many incidents have your Fire and Rescue Service been called out to attend, where hoarding was identified?

    Please break down the data as follows:

    1. 1st July 2018 – 30th June 2019
    2. 1st July 2019 – 30th June 2020
    3. 1st July 2020 – 30th June 2021
    4. 1st July 2021 – 30th June 2022
    5. 1st July 2022 – 30th June 2023
  2. For each year, how many of those incidents led to injury, and how many todeaths? Please state whether the injured/deceased where civilians or firefighters in each instance.
  3. For each year, in how many of those incidents was access to the fire or emergency obstructed due to hoarding at the property?
  4. Can you also please provide information regarding the number of incidents you have attended for each level of the Clutter Image Ratings?

If it is not possible to provide the information requested due to cost of compliance limits, please let me know how I can refine my request.

Our Response

Answer: - This information is not recorded in an easily retrievable format. To locate, retrieve and extract the requested information requires a manual search of all records held, we would have to examine each individual incident recorded in our incident management system between the 01/07/2018 and the 30/06/2019 to determine if hoarding was a factor and cross reference that information with our Community Fire Risk Management Information System to determine the clutter image rating. An initial search revealed a total of 9676 records over a one-year period.

It is estimated that to search one record would take approximately 7 minutes which would equate to approximately 1129 working hours (for one years’ worth of records). This takes the request over the cost threshold of 18 working hours and engages Section 12 (1) of the Act.

This letter constitutes a refusal notice under Section 17(5) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 with Section 12(1) of the act being applied.

12. – (1) Section 1(1) does not oblige a public authority to comply with a request for informationif the authority estimates that the cost of complying with the request would exceed theappropriate limit.

Should you wish for the Force to continue with your request, a more accurate figure will be provided within a fee’s notice. The cost will need to be paid by you, prior to any further investigation. Please advise if you wish to proceed.

Alternatively, you are invited to refine your request to bring it within the cost threshold, we are unable to provide a reasonable refinement to the request that would bring this section of the request within the cost threshold.

In accordance with the Act, once one part of the request exceeds the cost threshold the entire request exceeds the cost threshold. However, in the spirit of the Act but outside of Nottinghamshire Fire and Rescue Services has provided what information it has retrieved in relation to your request.

This letter constitutes a refusal notice under Section 17 (5) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

  1. In the last 5 years, how many incidents have your Fire and Rescue Service been called out to attend, where hoarding was identified? Please break down the data as follows:
    1. 1st July 2018 – 30th June 2019
    2. 1st July 2019 – 30th June 2020
    3. 1st July 2020 – 30th June 2021
    4. 1st July 2021 – 30th June 2022
    5. 1st July 2022 – 30th June 2023

    Answer: - Total number of incidents from the 1st of July 2019 where hoarding was identified.

    Incidents with Hoarding Identified
    Year Clutter Image Rating Grand Total
    6-7 CIR 8+ CIR
    2019 8 30 38
    2020 18 13 31
    2021 32 8 40
    2022 56 17 73
    Grand Total 114 68 182
  2. For each year, how many of those incidents led to injury, and how many t odeaths? Please state whether the injured/deceased where civilians orfirefighters in each instance. Answer:
    Incidents with Hoarding Identified
    Year Injuries/Casualties
    2019 1
    2020 2
    2021 1
    2022 3
    Grand Total 7
  3. For each year, in how many of those incidents was access to the fire or emergency obstructed due to hoarding at the property?

    Answer: - Only 1 recorded in 2021.

  4. Can you also please provide information regarding the number of incidents youhave attended for each level of the Clutter Image Ratings?

    Answer: - Please refer to the table in question 1 where the CIR is recorded at level 6 and above where Household environment constitutes a Safeguarding alert due to thesignificant risk to health of the householders, surrounding properties and residents.