Fire and Rescue Service Statistics, Scotland 2012-13

3. Changes to data collection and methodology

This is the fourth year that the Scottish Government has published data on Scotland's 8 Fire and Rescue Services (FRSs). On 1^st April 2013, the 8 FRSs of Scotland became the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service. The statistics in this publication cover the year immediately preceding the establishment of the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service. This is the final year that this publication will include statistics at the geographic level of the 8 FRSs.

The publication provides information on workforce, stations and equipment as a snapshot in time collected on 31 March 2013. Information on Home Fire Safety Visits (HFSVs), fire safety, and incidents where attacks on FRSs personnel occurred is provided from reports from the financial year 2012-13.

3.1 Changes to Definition of Houses in Multiple Occupation

This publication will include a change of definition of Houses in Multiple Occupation (HMOs) in accordance with the recommendations of an investigation into the issue.

In processing the data returns for the 2011-12 publication, an issue around HMO definitions was identified. It became clear that FRSs were reporting different definitions for HMOs within the fire safety collection. In order to understand the issue and find a solution, a statistical investigation was carried out at the beginning of 2013. The results of this can be found at the following link: Statistical Investigation into Houses in Multiple Occupation

In this publication information is based on the definition of licensed HMOs in the Housing (Scotland) Act 2006, part 5. The reporting of this information has been removed from the non-domestic buildings fire safety audit section and is reported separately in section 4.13.

The data in section 4.13 cannot be compared to previous information in this publication series as the definitions are not aligned. As this is the first year of publishing this information, it will be classified as experimental statistics with the expectation of making it official in the future.