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NFRS 2023 90 - Deliberate Fires

You asked for

I am writing to obtain the following information from the fire service in relation to deliberate fires across the county.

Please can you provide:

  1. The number of incidents attended by crews where fires were deemed to have been started deliberately. Please provide annual statistics for the 10 years up to now.
  2. The estimated cost to the fire service on attending these incidents.
  3. The number of people killed/injured in fires which were deemed to have been started deliberately. Please provide annual statistics for the 10 years up to now.
  4. The three locations where the most deliberate fires have been started, including the number of incidents for each. Please provide statistics over the past 10 years up to now.
  5. The number of fires in the outdoors attended by crews. Please provide annual statistics for the 10 years up to now.

Our Response:

  1. The number of incidents attended by crews where fires were deemed to have been started deliberately. Please provide annual statistics for the 10 years up to now. Answer: -
    Year Incidents Appliances Attending Average Time Per Pump (mins) Average Cost of Attending Based on 23/24 Pricing
    2013 1,747 2,200 42.53

    £819,500.00
    2014 1,697 2,083 39.63 £775,917.50
    2015 1,676 2,153 40.73 £801,992.50
    2016 1,504 1,945 45.07 £724,512.50
    2017 1,668 2,203 49.88 £820,617.50
    2018 2,002 2,618 51.76 £975,205.00
    2019 1,567 1,921 40.13 £715,572.50
    2020 1,438 1,853 46.26 £690,242.50
    2021 1,581 2,003 44.57 £746,117.50
    2022 2,034 2,687 56.13 £1,000,907.50
    2023 1,282 1,845 42.26 £687.262.50
    Total 18,196 23,511 45.74 £8,757,847.50
  2. The estimated cost to the fire service on attending these incidents.

    Answer: - Please refer to the table in question one. Be advised that individual costs are not per incident are not recorded and we’ve provided an average estimate based on service charges for the 23/24 financial period.

  3. The number of people killed/injured in fires which were deemed to have been started deliberately. Please provide annual statistics for the 10 years up to now.

    Answer: - Exempt by virtue of Section 21 of the Freedom of Information Act.

  4. The three locations where the most deliberate fires have been started, including the number of incidents for each. Please provide statistics over the past 10 years up to now.

    Answer: -

    Year 12: HM Prison Ranby 14: Lowdham Grange Prison 26: HM Prison, Sherwood
    2013 3 6 7
    2014 3 4 20
    2015 21 6 51
    2016 13 10 45
    2017 19 15 36
    2018 16 3 17
    2019 14 25 12
    2020 5 19 8
    2021 9 11 11
    2022 22 6 13
    2023 36 81 38
    Total 161 186 258
  5. The number of fires in the outdoors attended by crews. Please provide annualstatistics for the 10 years up to now.

    Answer: - Exempt by virtue of Section 21 of the Freedom of Information Act.

Some of the information requested has been deemed exempt by virtue of section 21(1) Information reasonably accessible by other means, under the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

21.Information accessible to applicant by other means.

  1. Information which is reasonably accessible to the applicant otherwise than under section 1is exempt information.
  2. For the purposes of subsection (1)—
    1. Information may be reasonably accessible to the applicant even though it is accessibleonly on payment, and
    2. Information is to be taken to be reasonably accessible to the applicant if it is informationwhich the public authority or any other person is obliged by or under any enactment tocommunicate (otherwise than by making the information available for inspection) tomembers of the public on request, whether free of charge or on payment.
  3. For the purposes of subsection (1), information which is held by a public authority and doesnot fall within subsection (2)(b) is not to be regarded as reasonably accessible to theapplicant merely because the information is available from the public authority itself onrequest, unless the information is made available in accordance with the authority’s publication scheme and any payment required is specified in, or determined in accordance with, the scheme.

Section 21 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 is categorised as an Absolute and Class Based type exemption and therefore does not require a public interest test to be carried nor must Nottinghamshire Fire and Rescue Service articulate the harm in disclosure.

The information requested can be accessed at the following location.

Fire statistics data tables - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)