Yarl's Wood Fire
Ms Diane Abbott (Hackney, North and Stoke Newington): The fire at Yarl's Wood endangered the lives of hundreds of people, including hundreds of innocent detainees. The Home Secretary refers to hindsight, but the question of sprinklers is not one of hindsight. The relevant fire authorities advised at the time that sprinklers should be installed at such a facility. He says that it will be relatively easy to ascertain the facts of that issue. Can he tell the House whose advice the authorities took over and above that of the fire service in not installing sprinklers?
Mr. Blunkett: The Minister responsible took advice not only internally, but from a number of fire services, given the different locations of the centres. There was conflicting advice from different fire services about the likelihood of such an outbreak. Again with hindsight, and given the particular fabrics of Yarl's Wood—this is true of Harmondsworth, but not of other centres, which are built on a different model and do not rely on wood—I believe that my predecessors would have installed sprinklers. That is what I am intent on doing, but no individual placed in such circumstances—outside prison in centres built to provide not prison conditions, but comfortable living conditions—is in any way exonerated from choosing to burn it down.
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