Paul King Mifiree   11/09/2018 at 17:08

With regard to the debate on the new name following the proposed Charter, I must admit that originally I felt the name change to The Chartered Institution of Fire, was a positive move. The more I think on this and the more views I seek from my colleagues (who are not in the fire profession and so representative of the public at large) I think such a name change seems a bit vague and would not have the desired impact. My own preference would be to hang our colours firmly to our engineering roots but include the word 'Safety' in the title. This would give the new title of The Chartered Institution of Fire Safety Engineers. I also think it is up to the Institution to persuade members that even though some do not consider themselves as engineers in the strict sense, they are still in fact engineers whether they are comfortable with this or not. I believe the standard definition for engineers, used by the Engineering Council, is broard enough to include the work carried out by most, if not all of our members to a greater or lesser degree. That does not mean to say that everyone should consider themselves worthy of registration as a Chartered Engineer through the EC, but nvertheless, everyone should feel comfortable with the engineer title. For example, many members are firefighters. Firefighting involves a number of activities that fall into the definition of engineer, for instance, calculating water pressure for hose lines, working out duration of breathing apparatus etc. Even employing knowledge of building construction when tackling fires would be considered as an engineering task. To recap, I do not think we need to shy away from the beloved engineer title, I think we need to market it more effectively, to both members and the public.

Bill Kehoe, Mifiree   12/09/2018 at 12:20

I support Mr. King's comments.

Gwyn Cardwell   17/09/2018 at 15:42

I support the above comments