National Headquarters
Fire and Emergency New Zealand
National Headquarters
Spark Central, Level 7
42-52 Willis Street
Wellington Central
Wellington 6011
Phone +64 4 496 3600
2 February 2023
Nigel Gray
By email: [FYI request #21441 email]
Tēnā koe Nigel
Information Request – Statistics relating to a Fire and Emergency advertisement
I refer to your official information request dated 17 December 2022 asking for the following
information
.
“Your recent advertisement claims that 1 in 4 housefires start in the kitchen and
that 50% of all fatal housefires involves drugs or alcohol. Can you please provide the
statistics and source for these claims.”
In accordance with the provisions of the Official Information Act 1982 (OIA), please find enclosed
the data you have requested. The data used in the advertisement, and in this response, was pulled
from Fire and Emergency New Zealand’s residential property fire statistics 2016-2020.
Appendix 1 – data on unattended cooking
Over the 5-year period the percentage of residential fires caused by unattended cooking was
24.93%. Please note, this is a subset of the fires started in the kitchen, so the percent of house
fires starting in the kitchen is at least 25%.
Appendix 2 – data on fatal house fires involving drugs and alcohol
Over the 5-year period the percentage of fatal fires was 50%. Please note, not all reporting and
investigations state alcohol involvement even in instances when there may had been. The data
provided was from all recorded information.
Drugs are only reported where a drug analysis was undertaken as part of an autopsy however Fire
and Emergency do not readily hold this data. Therefore, this part of your request is refused under
section 18(e) of the OIA as the information does not exist or, despite reasonable efforts to locate
it, cannot be found.
You have the right to seek an investigation and review by the Ombudsman of this decision.
Information about how to make a complaint is availab
le at www.ombudsman.parliament.nz or
freephone 0800 802 602.
Note also that this response (with your personal details removed) may be published on the Fire and
Emergency website.
Nāku noa nā
Julia McCook-Weir
Manager, Information Requests
encl
