PROTECTION OF LIFE AND PROPERTY AGAINST FIRE.

Press, Volume XII, Issue 1586, 6 December 1867, Page 3

PROTECTION OF LIFE AND PROPERTY AGAINST FIRE.

[From the "Times.' , ] Five months ago, in the whirl and tumult of political conflict, a Select Committee of the House of Commons was appointed to enquire into the I provisions at present existing for the protection of life and property against fire. If it be asked why at such a moment such a question should have been taken up, the answer will plainly appear in the report which the investigation has produced. The simple fact is that the matter was one of the most obvious urgency. It is hardly too much to say that up to this very hour no action whatever has been taken in this matter by the State itself on behalf of the people. Certain Building Acts, local as well as general, and certain restrictions upon the storage of inflammable goods, form the only exceptions to the statement. As far es regards the institution or maintenance of fire brigades, with their necessary machinery for preserving life and saving property, no provisions whatever were made by the Legislature until the year 1865, and then only as regarded the metropolis. All that was done was done by voluntary associations or by insurance companies acting of their own free will for their own direct interests. When a house was insured it was worth the while of the insurance company to save it if possible from being burnt, and co the several fire offices kept engines and buckets in the more important towns; but they were not bound to do so, and if they chose to let a street burn to the ground there was nothing to prevent them. What Parliament did in 1865 was to take the metropolitan establishments maintained by the

various offices and hand them over to the Board" of "Works," to be adminis-" tered by one central authority for the good of the public. But that reform applied to the capital only. Throughout all the rest of the country things remain exactly as before, and what this condition is will be presently seen. In making provision against fire we may direct our attention to three distinct points. We may stipulate for the construction of buildings in such a fashion as to be more or less incombustible or fire-proof, and in proportion as we can accomplish this object we may feel ourselves tolerably secure. Again, we may establish an effective machinery for prompt and powerful succour in cases of fire, so as to be prepared by means of fire-engines and fire-escapes to save life and property in defiance of the most terrible conflagration. Or we may so multiply precautions and safeguards that fires will never occur at all, and no fire brigades be wanting. It will be easily seen, however, that by no one of these methods singly taken can protection be rendered absolute, and that prudence requires the combination of all three. During the last twenty years various Acts have been passed for insuring the better construction of buildings, and much, as we are ready to believe, has been accomplished in this direction ; but out of the eighty largest towns in the kingdom no fewer than sixty are without any special regulations on this point, and it must be obvious, besides, that all the old houses in a town —that is to Bay, nine-tenths of the entire place —would remain unaffected by auy such legislation. As regards the second consideration, few large towns are without fire-engines maintained in some way or by some means or other; but there are exceptions even to this rule, and it is evidently probable that in smaller towns, from which no returns have been received, affairs might be found less satisfactory. The third of the points above mentioned deserves especial notice. If we could absolutely prevent the occurrence of fires we should need neither fire-proof houses nor fire engines ; but it must be understood at this point of the case that, we have something beyond accidents to deal with. Of all the fires which may occur vyithin a given period it is estimated that one-third are not accidental at all, but intentional —that is.to say, the work of incendiaries. Of course this must be presumption only, but it is sustained by solid facts. The number of fires increases out of all proportion to the increase of habited houses or population ; a large proportion of this number cannot be accounted for on any supposition of accident, and five-sixths of these unaccountable fires occur in London on insured property — in other words, where there is a motive for incendiarism. Now, it is clear that as regards fires of this kind' we can do no good either by Building Acts or any ordinary regulations or precautions. Anything may be set fire to if a man is bent on doing it. We may diminish the destructiveness of the conflagration, but nothing more. The only remedies in our power are inquiry and punishment, and these at present are but imperfectly available. Up to the, year 1860 there was a salutary belief that the coroner possessed authority to hold his inquest over a fire as well as over a death; but the Court of Queen's Bench dispelled that, popular superstition, and now the inquiry is nobody's business. The insurance companies, it is true, have an interest in detecting incendiaries, but they have a still greater interest in maintaining a popular character, and, for the sake of this reputation, they are extremely reluctant to institute a prosecution or dispute a claim. Arson, therefore, goes unpunished, and arson, it must be remembered, is, under these circumstances, a crime of a very comprehensive character. The wilful " fire-raising" thus designated by our ancestors, and originating in simple malice, is now the least common of such occurrences. Incendiarism is practised as a trade with the view of realising the sum for which the property is insured, or it is resorted to by insolvent traders for the purpose of covering their misfortunes, or by persons employed in warehouses to conceal their thefts. Against all these temptations to crime society demands protection, and" the committee judiciously recommend that the presumptive authority of the coroner should be confirmed and established. In the first instance, the officers of the fire brigade or the police should be charged with the duty of noting any suspicious features, and their report to the coroner should be the warrant for that functionary's intervention. As regards the construction of buildings, little more is required, as the committee discern, than the extension of the Metropolitan Building Act to the rest of the kingdom by some general statute ; but it deserves to be noticed under this head that modern society is exposed to perils unknown in ancient times. Spontaneous combustion is no longer either a myth or a marvel, but a very common occurrence. Petroleum, now an important article of commerce, throws off an inflam- 1 mable vapour at 100 degrees of heat— that is to say, at a lower temperature than we have had in the sun this very week. Some specimens of this oil will explode even more easily, and there is this ugly aspect of the case, that whereas the Americans have stringently forbidden the sale of the more dangerous qualities in the United States, such specimens are all the more likely to be exported. The committee advise, therefore, that rigid tests should be applied to these imports, and strict regulations as to storage enforced. But the perils of modern date do not end here. Trade is now conducted on so prodigious a scale, and warehouses are built of such enormous size, that a fire in one of such establishments becomes a conflagration, and defies all attempts to subdue it. The goods exposed to these risks are not, perhaps, actually inflammable, but if they are only readily

combustible, the system of storage will do the rest. It appears, too, as if some of our notions of fire-proofing were altogether mistaken, for the committee were assured by professional witnesses that iron was of little use in stopping the progress of a fire, and that wooden stairs were rather safer than stone. Thesf, however, are some of the facts alleged and the conclusions inferred ; but we must not finish without remarking that the recommendations still include no suggestion whatever for the extension or control of fire brigades or other machinery for the extinction of fires and preservation of life and property. It is, indeed, observed in the report that if this machinery were brought under the regular control of the local authorities in large towns it " would be much more satisfactory ;" but, practically, our reliance is still to be placed upon private or voluntary organizations. Happily such organizations will go a long way in this country, and public opinion is becoming more and more alive to the necessity of action.