I suppose I should have expected it. Look what I've just read on the
NICEIC website:

quote

Face up to new electrical safety law or face fines

Homeowners warned to SWITCH ON to new building regulations

The NICEIC is urging homeowners who plan to tackle home improvement
projects to be aware of tough new changes to building regulations, which
if not complied with, could land you with a massive £5,000 fine and a
property you can't sell.

The new building regulation Part P, effective since 1st January 2005,
requires most electrical work in the home to be carried out by a
government-approved electrician, such as one registered with the NICEIC.
Its aim is to stop the rising number of deaths from faulty electrics,
much of which is undertaken by over ambitious DIY enthusiasts and cowboy
electricians.

Under the new law, homeowners are still able to replace accessories such
as light switches and sockets to an existing circuit, although there are
exceptions for locations such as kitchens and bathrooms. An electrician
registered under a government-approved scheme must undertake all other
work. The alternative, for DIY'ers, is to notify a local building
control body before starting any work and pay the appropriate fee for an
inspection and a certificate after work is completed.

"This law will make homes safer and is long overdue", says Jim Speirs
director general of electrical safety body, the NICEIC. "Homeowners will
now be protected from dangerous electrics as a competent electrician
will provide them with a certificate once they've completed the work. If
you don't get a certificate or do the work yourself without getting it
checked, you will not only be sitting on a potential electrical time
bomb, but committing a criminal offence too. Your local authority can
order the removal or correction of any work and fine you up to £5,000."

Failure to comply could also make it difficult to sell your house in the
future. The NICEIC advises that electrical installation certificates are
likely to be included in the government's proposed home sellers' packs.
These are designed to offer prospective buyers reassurance and peace of
mind about the safety of homes being offered for sale. Amazingly,
electricians have never been regulated despite faulty electrics causing
an average of 12,500 house fires, 750 serious injuries and 10 deaths
each year.

The NICEIC welcomes the government's decision to finally clamp down on
the cowboys who cause these deaths and is advising homeowners to make
sure they only employ government-approved electricians

/quote

No need to restart the arguments, we can all Google. I just needed to
pass this on having had one of those "grrr..." moments.

Hwyl!

M.

--
Martin Angove: http://www.tridwr.demon.co.uk/
Two free issues: http://www.livtech.co.uk/ Living With Technology
.... The Eternal Triangle is usually right tangled.

On Tue, 07 Jun 2005 20:09:48 +0100, Martin Angove
babbled like a waterfall and said:

No need to restart the arguments, we can all Google. I just needed to
pass this on having had one of those "grrr..." moments.

Hwyl!

M.

They can still get stuffed!

EricP wrote:

They can still get stuffed!

That's a lot more politely expressed than the deeply encrypted (can you
say ROT-13?) .sig on every posting from one of the two 'moderators' at
the highly-trafficked forum of this month's Winner Of Friends and
Influencer Of People. Hope that's the positioning he's after for his
company...

Ok, I was going to leave it at that, not mentioning other "news
releases" on the same or similar subject... until I noticed the
following:

http://www.niceic.org.uk/partp/newsitemjan052.html

(the one I quoted)

Says:

Amazingly, electricians have never been regulated despite faulty
electrics causing an average of 12,500 house fires, 750 serious injuries
and 10 deaths each year.

But

http://www.niceic.org.uk/press/prnov044.html

says:

Amazingly, electricians have never been regulated despite faulty
electrics causing an average of 19 deaths and 2,000 injuries every year.

And

http://www.niceic.org.uk/press/prdec043.html

says:

Amazingly, electricians have never been regulated despite faulty
electrics causing an average of 2336 house fires, 750 serious injuries
and 10 deaths each year.

and

http://www.niceic.org.uk/press/prsept0704.html

says:

Despite the fact that faulty electrics result in 19 deaths and over
2,000 non-fatal electric shock accidents each year,

and

http://www.niceic.org.uk/press/prdec03.html

says:

According to Government statistics, fixed electrical installations in
homes in England and Wales cause around 5 fatalities and over 500
non-fatal injuries every year. And 12,500 fires in homes across the
country are reported as having an electrical source of ignition causing
about 25 deaths and 590 nonfatal injuries each year.

and

http://www.niceic.org.uk/consumers/moving.html

says:

According to Government figures, around 10% of domestic fires are
electrical, and of these, a third are directly due to old or bad wiring.
This equates to over 2,000 electric shock accidents and 9,300 electrical
fires in homes every year.

and I'm sure if I looked further I'd see more. So what is it then?

5, 10, 19 or 30 deaths a year?

2336, 9300 or 12500 house fires?

750, 1090 or 2000 injuries?

Or is it just that these people make the figures up on the spot to try
to prove a point?

Hwyl!

M.


--
Martin Angove: http://www.tridwr.demon.co.uk/
Two free issues: http://www.livtech.co.uk/ Living With Technology
.... After we pull the pin, Mr. Grenade is NOT our friend!

Hi Martin

5, 10, 19 or 30 deaths a year?

2336, 9300 or 12500 house fires?

750, 1090 or 2000 injuries?

Or to put it another way;
Up to 0.00005% of the UK population die each year
Up to 0.063% of UK housing stock catches fire
Up to 0.0034% of the UK population are injured.

No wonder we need legislation - its a national scandal.

Dave

"David Lang" wrote in message
o.uk...
Hi Martin

5, 10, 19 or 30 deaths a year?

2336, 9300 or 12500 house fires?

750, 1090 or 2000 injuries?

Or to put it another way;
Up to 0.00005% of the UK population die each year
Up to 0.063% of UK housing stock catches fire
Up to 0.0034% of the UK population are injured.

No wonder we need legislation - its a national scandal.

Dave


How many people die of MRSA every year? If it's more than 10 ( or 19 )
then I suggest they spend the money on cleaners, and do something
useful and popular for a change. Fat chance....

Andy.

andrewpreece wrote:

How many people die of MRSA every year? If it's more than 10 ( or 19 )

5000 on secondary infections acquired in hospital (of which MRSA is one
of the more common). That is the government figure however, so any guess
as to what the real one is.



--
Cheers,

John.

/================================================== ===============\
| Internode Ltd - http://www.internode.co.uk |
|-----------------------------------------------------------------|
| John Rumm - john(at)internode(dot)co(dot)uk |
\================================================= ================/

On Tue, 07 Jun 2005 22:50:26 GMT, David Lang wrote:

5, 10, 19 or 30 deaths a year?

No wonder we need legislation - its a national scandal.

Yet we still allow people to be in control of a tonne or more of metal
doing many tens of miles per hour. Several thousand people are killed
on the roads each year (think about it 3650 is 10 a *day*...) and
several tens of thousands suffer serious injury.

--
Cheers
Dave. pam is missing e-mail

On Wed, 08 Jun 2005 00:36:30 +0100 (BST), "Dave Liquorice"
wrote:

Yet we still allow people to be in control of a tonne or more of metal
doing many tens of miles per hour.

Not for much longer -- I hope we've all written to our MPs in protest at
the idea of satellite tracking all cars in the UK.

Then think of the added "convenience", when they have to be tied into
our compulsory ID cards.

Andy Dingley wrote:

Not for much longer -- I hope we've all written to our MPs in protest at
the idea of satellite tracking all cars in the UK.

Then think of the added "convenience", when they have to be tied into
our compulsory ID cards.

And all those speeding tickets they could automatically generate...

--
Cheers,

John.

/================================================== ===============\
| Internode Ltd - http://www.internode.co.uk |
|-----------------------------------------------------------------|
| John Rumm - john(at)internode(dot)co(dot)uk |
\================================================= ================/

Andy Dingley wrote:
On Wed, 08 Jun 2005 00:36:30 +0100 (BST), "Dave Liquorice"
wrote:


Yet we still allow people to be in control of a tonne or more of metal
doing many tens of miles per hour.


Not for much longer -- I hope we've all written to our MPs in protest at
the idea of satellite tracking all cars in the UK.

Then think of the added "convenience", when they have to be tied into
our compulsory ID cards.


But don't both ideas contravene our human rights of privacy?

Dave

Andy Dingley wrote:

Not for much longer -- I hope we've all written to our MPs in protest at
the idea of satellite tracking all cars in the UK.

Silver foil on the antennae/reciever.
Won't be difficult to lose a GPS signal, or swamp the tiddlywatt signal
with a few watts of spurious emissions on the right frequency.

Can't see what all the paranoia is about, it will never take off or be
policeable, and evasive techniques will be so simple.


--
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http://trade-price-supplements.co.uk - TRADE PRICED SUPPLEMENTS for ALL!
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http://gymratz.co.uk/hot-seat.htm - Live web-cam! (sometimes)

"Dave Liquorice" wrote in message
ll.com...
On Tue, 07 Jun 2005 22:50:26 GMT, David Lang wrote:

5, 10, 19 or 30 deaths a year?

No wonder we need legislation - its a national scandal.

Yet we still allow people to be in control of a tonne or more of metal
doing many tens of miles per hour.

But apparently only if you're over 24 if that judge gets his way.

Dave Liquorice wrote:
On Tue, 07 Jun 2005 22:50:26 GMT, David Lang wrote:


5, 10, 19 or 30 deaths a year?

No wonder we need legislation - its a national scandal.


Yet we still allow people to be in control of a tonne or more of metal
doing many tens of miles per hour. Several thousand people are killed
on the roads each year (think about it 3650 is 10 a *day*...) and
several tens of thousands suffer serious injury.

Probably "electricians" in their white vans are the main culprits.
Oh, I forgot, they are mainly sat outside elec wholesalers drinking
tea/smoking when they've "gone to get parts".

On Tue, 07 Jun 2005 20:37:57 +0100, Martin Angove wrote:

http://www.niceic.org.uk/consumers/moving.html

says:

According to Government figures, around 10% of domestic fires are
electrical, and of these, a third are directly due to old or bad wiring.
This equates to over 2,000 electric shock accidents and 9,300 electrical
fires in homes every year.

So if a third of 10% of house fires is 9,300, that would mean 279,000 house
fires in total each year.
According to
http://www.odpm.gov.uk/stellent/groups/odpm_fire/documents/downloadable/odpm_fire_028259.pdf
in 2002 there were 65,000 dwelling fires overall. 2,773 caused by
electrical distribution. So the 1/3 of 10% is in the right ballpark, but
not the numbers.

Martin Angove wrote:

The NICEIC is urging homeowners who plan to tackle home improvement
projects to be aware of tough new changes to building regulations, which
if not complied with, could land you with a massive £5,000 fine and a
property you can't sell.

I shall wait with interest to see if there are any documented cases of that
actually happening. I suspect I'm in for a long wait ?

--
Mark
Please replace invalid and invalid with gmx and net to reply

In article ,
Martin Angove wrote:
If you don't get a certificate or do the work yourself without getting
it checked, you will not only be sitting on a potential electrical time
bomb, but committing a criminal offence too.

So they provide a say 10 year warranty on their member's work?

--
*Even a blind pig stumbles across an acorn now and again *

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

In message ,
"Dave Plowman (News)" wrote:

In article ,
Martin Angove wrote:
If you don't get a certificate or do the work yourself without getting
it checked, you will not only be sitting on a potential electrical time
bomb, but committing a criminal offence too.

So they provide a say 10 year warranty on their member's work?

The legal requirement is 2 years.

And you can't buy insurance for that as yet, not even from the NICEIC.

Hwyl!

M.

--
Martin Angove: http://www.tridwr.demon.co.uk/
Two free issues: http://www.livtech.co.uk/ Living With Technology
.... CtrlAltDel to read the next message

In article ,
Martin Angove writes:
In message ,
"Dave Plowman (News)" wrote:

In article ,
Martin Angove wrote:
If you don't get a certificate or do the work yourself without getting
it checked, you will not only be sitting on a potential electrical time
bomb, but committing a criminal offence too.

So they provide a say 10 year warranty on their member's work?

The legal requirement is 2 years.

There's no legal requirement at all.

And you can't buy insurance for that as yet, not even from the NICEIC.

--
Andrew Gabriel

In message ,
(Andrew Gabriel) wrote:

In article ,
Martin Angove writes:
In message ,
"Dave Plowman (News)" wrote:

In article ,
Martin Angove wrote:
If you don't get a certificate or do the work yourself without getting
it checked, you will not only be sitting on a potential electrical time
bomb, but committing a criminal offence too.

So they provide a say 10 year warranty on their member's work?

The legal requirement is 2 years.

There's no legal requirement at all.

And you can't buy insurance for that as yet, not even from the NICEIC.


Fair enough, but to be registered for the purposes of Part P with any of
NICEIC, ECA, ELECSA, whatever, whatever, they *all* require the
applicant to have a minimum of £2M public liability insurance, and
insurance in place to be able to offer an (optional) 2-year warranty on
all work undertaken. This insurance isn't easy to find for the slole
trader, and although NICEIC say they are "working on it" even they don't
yet have a scheme in place apparently.

Hwyl!

M.

--
Martin Angove: http://www.tridwr.demon.co.uk/
Two free issues: http://www.livtech.co.uk/ Living With Technology
.... If at first you don't succeed, destroy all evidence that you tried.