Evaluation of Home Fire Safety Checks Program for Fire Rescue NSW: Draft Report

The Home Fire Safety Checks (HFSC) program being undertaken by Fire Rescue New South Wales (FRNSW) has the aim of engaging and educating targeted at risk groups to prevent and prepare for fires. The HFSC involves staged home visitations aimed to ensure that all homes have at least one working smoke alarm and to increase awareness of home fire safety. Western Sydney University (WSU) under the Community Resilience Innovation Program Funding Agreement 2014-15 obtained funding to undertake Evaluation of the HFSC program for the calendar year 2015. The core element of the evaluation entails the survey of the vulnerable individuals visited through the HFSC program to assess knowledge and attitudes. As part of the agreement signed between FRNSW and WSU is the delivery of the draft report on findings. The HFSC program entails the use of Mosaic life style profile data to better understand which types of people are at greatest risk from accidental fires in the home. Mosaic classifies Australia's neighbourhoods into 49 Types and 13 broad Groups, at a level of an average of 16-20 households. It is built using Australian demographic data from 2011 Census and other best available data sources (a total of 238 variables). The data is used to target the top 'at risk' groups that represents 37% of fires and 43% of injuries over six years. At the pilot stage, the target 'at risk' group chosen was K42 Constant Struggle(single parents and the elderly living side by side in rented flats in city central locations) for Greater Western Sydney and for the rural location of Young the risk group chosen was M49 Armchair Blues (Single and step family households with stretched budgets in remote locations). These two groups represent the top two Mosaic types by combined fire and injury risk index. The program delivery entails the identification of the streets, the conduct of mail drop of postcards with message of the upcoming visit, the door-to-door knocks by FRNSW personnel inviting residents to receive the HFSC program. The delivery of the program can entail any/all of the following: Checking of existing smoke alarm(s), Installation of battery(ies) in smoke alarm(s), Installation of smoke alarm(s), Conduct of home fire safety check, Discussion of safety in the kitchen, Discussion of treatment of heaters and safety, Discussion of safety and electrical cords, Presentation of HFSC fire safety brochure, The HFSC program delivery may include other FRNSW campaign messages or products. For example, the 2015 winter campaign was "Keep looking when cooking" and entailed radio campaigns, digital messages, and provision of a wooden spoon designed as a talking or reminder medium. The HFSC program delivery has been constrained to the use of retained firefighters following instruction from the Fire Brigade Employees Union (FBEU) that permanent members are banned from undertaking the HFSC program (Fire Brigade Employees' Union 2015). The matter was taken to the Industrial Relations Commission whereby the recommendation was made that the ban be lifted. The FBEU refused to comply with the recommendation and the ban remains (Fire Brigade Employees' Union 2015). The delivery of the HFSC program was impacted by the delivery of the training material in terms of timing, geographical coverage and station commander/fire fighter engagement with the program. This was observed by the clustering of stations and geographical areas that receive the HFSC program. Data on the HFSC program delivery was affected by the move from paper based collection of information on program delivery to an "app" based. In the roll-out of the software, recording and extraction of information issues have been identified. This includes homes being recorded as having received all aspects of the HFSC program when no one had answered the door or when FRNSW crew delivered information on the outside of the house. This was identified in the intervention households' responses and the significant number who reported that they did not have a visit. In addition, the data extraction of the information collected by the personnel delivering the program, including the aspects of the HFSC program delivered to each household, were a challenge to provide for the evaluator.