Jarrow March
The Jarrow March of 5 – 31 October 1936 known as the Jarrow Crusade, was an organised protest against the unemployment and poverty suffered in the English Tyneside town of Jarrow during the 1930s. Around 200 men marched from Jarrow to London, carrying a petition to the British government requesting the re-establishment of industry in the town following the closure in 1934 of its main employer, Palmer's shipyard; the petition was received by the House of Commons but not debated, the march produced few immediate results. The Jarrovians went home believing. Jarrow had been a settlement since at least the 8th century. In the early 19th century, a coal industry developed before the establishment of the shipyard in 1851. Over the following 80 years more than 1,000 ships were launched in Jarrow. In the 1920s, a combination of mismanagement and changed world trade conditions following the First World War brought a decline which led to the yard's closure. Plans for its replacement by a modern steelworks plant were frustrated by opposition from the British Iron and Steel Federation, an employers' organisation with its own plans for the industry.
The failure of the steelworks plan, the lack of any prospect of large-scale employment in the town, were the final factors that led to the decision to march. Marches of the unemployed to London, termed "hunger marches", had taken place since the early 1920s organised by the National Unemployed Workers' Movement, a communist-led body. For fear of being associated with communist agitation, the Labour Party and Trades Union Congress leaderships stood aloof from these marches, they exercised the same policy of detachment towards the Jarrow March, organised by the borough council with the support of all sections of the town but without any connection with the NUWM. During their journey the Jarrow marchers received sustenance and hospitality from local branches of all the main political parties, were given a broad public welcome on their arrival in London. Despite the initial sense of failure among the marchers, in subsequent years, the Jarrow March became recognised by historians as a defining event of the 1930s.
It helped to foster the change in attitudes which prepared the way to social reform measures after the Second World War, which their proponents thought would improve working conditions. The town holds numerous memorials to the march. Re-enactments celebrated the 50th and 75th anniversaries, in both cases invoking the "spirit of Jarrow" in their campaigns against unemployment. In contrast to the Labour Party's coldness in 1936, the post-war party leadership adopted the march as a metaphor for governmental callousness and working-class fortitude. In the period after the end of the First World War, Britain's economy enjoyed a brief boom. Businesses rushed to replenish stocks and re-establish peacetime conditions of trade, while prices rose wages rose faster and unemployment was negligible. By April 1920 this boom had given way to Britain's first post-war slump, which ushered in an era of high unemployment. Britain's adoption of deflationary economic policies, including a return to the gold standard in 1925, helped to ensure that the percentage of the workforce without jobs remained at around 10% for the rest of the 1920s and beyond, well above the normal pre-war levels.
During the world recession that began in 1929 and lasted until 1932, the percentage of unemployed peaked at 22%, representing more than 3 million workers. Unemployment was heavy in Britain's traditional staple export industries—coal mining, shipbuilding and steel and textiles—all of which were in a slow decline from their Victorian heyday; because of the concentration of these industries in the north of England, in Scotland and in Wales, the percentage of unemployed persons in these regions was higher, sometimes more than double, than in the south throughout the interwar period. The decline of these industries helped to create pockets of long-term unemployment outside the normal cyclical variations. In 1921, in reaction to the rising levels of unemployment, the newly formed British Communist Party set up the National Unemployed Workers' Movement. From 1922 until the late 1930s, under its charismatic leader Wal Hannington, the NUWM organised regular marches in which unemployed workers converged on London to confront Parliament, in the belief that this would improve conditions.
These became known as "hunger marches", reviving a name coined by the press in 1908, when a group of London's unemployed marched to Hyde Park. The 1922 marchers sought a meeting with the new prime minister, Bonar Law, who refused to see them because of their undemocratic leadership; the march leaders were denounced in The Times as "avowed Communists... who have been identified with disturbances in their own localities". The Labour Party and the TUC kept aloof, fearful of being tainted by association with the communist organisers; the same pattern was followed with subsequent NUWM marches. In 1931 MacDonald became head of a Conservative-dominated National Government that imposed a means test on unemployment benefits. Anger at the means test was the rationale for the 1932 hunger march, in which a series of rallies and demonstrations across London broke out into considerable violence. Although women were not allowed t
Jarrow Hall – Anglo-Saxon Farm, Village and Bede Museum
Jarrow Hall - Anglo-Saxon Farm and Bede Museum is a museum in Jarrow, South Tyneside, England which celebrates the life of the Venerable Bede. The site features a museum dedicated to the life and times of the famous monk, with other features and attractions - including a reconstructed Anglo-Saxon farm and the 18th Century Georgian building Jarrow Hall House itself - reflected in a calendar of activities, including special themed events, an educational programme for schools and heritage skills workshops, alongside space for businesses and events; the Anglo-Saxon attraction Bede's World opened on an 11-acre site in Jarrow in 1993 at a cost of £10m, was run by the Bede's World Charitable Trust, with grant support from the local council. Although the complex attracted 70,000 visitors a year, it became no longer financially viable and ceased operation in February 2016; the writer and broadcaster Melvyn Bragg was critical of its closure, in an item on BBC Radio 4's Broadcasting House in 2016, he contrasted the museum's plight to the funding made available to the Garden Bridge Project in London.
It was announced in August 2016 that the former Bede's World site would re-open as'Jarrow Hall Anglo-Saxon Farm and Bede Museum', to be managed by the charity Groundwork's South Tyneside and Newcastle trust. Following over £100,000 of investment by Groundwork and a soft-open in October 2016, the site launched on 8 April 2017, hosting activities for all ages including farm talks, live re-enactment combat, authentic Anglo Saxon craft and lectures, as well as the reconstructed historical dwellings being renovated by authentically-attired workers using traditional wattle and daub building techniques; the interior of Jarrow Hall House was renovated with Georgian-era expertise provided by Durham University, hosts a new coffee shop, Hive Coffee Company. The direction and development of the site is now led by Leigh Venus, former Venue Manager of Newcastle upon Tyne's historic Tyneside Cinema; the Bede Museum building features an "Age of Bede" exhibit, which includes excavated artefacts from the historic monastery such as stained glass, imported pottery and stone carvings, exhibits about Anglo-Saxon culture, Bede's life and works, the life of a monk, the medieval Kingdom of Northumbria.
There is a working reconstructed Anglo-Saxon farm called Gyrwe after the Old English name for Jarrow, showing animal husbandry with full-size reconstructions of three timber buildings from Northumbria based on the evidence of archaeological work. Thirlings Hall was the largest, with animal hide and other objects. A wood-burning fire in the form of a small pit/designated area is used throughout the year, allows for a great smell to filter through the building; the two other buildings, smaller in size, are a grubenhaus - a sunken building used as a cold store - and a monk's cell. All buildings were built using traditional techniques; the farm animals are of similar breeds to animals that would have been present circa 1300 years ago, to simulate the types of animals which would have been seen in Anglo-Saxon England. Ancient strains of wheat and vegetables, such as those the monks might have eaten, used to be selectively grown on site. Visitors are able to tour the ruins of the Anglo-Saxon monastery of St Paul, designated a Scheduled Ancient Monument.
The site features a coffee shop located in Jarrow Hall House, an 18th-century Georgian property adjacent to the Bede Museum. The Medieval herb garden situated at the rear of Jarrow Hall House features over 200 species of herbs, there is a gift shop situated within the Bede Museum; the site house events and conference facilities, both within Jarrow Hall House and the Bede Museum building. Jarrow Hall Official Site ]
Dissolution of the Monasteries
The Dissolution of the Monasteries, sometimes referred to as the Suppression of the Monasteries, was the set of administrative and legal processes between 1536 and 1541 by which Henry VIII disbanded monasteries, priories and friaries in England and Ireland, appropriated their income, disposed of their assets, provided for their former personnel and functions. Although the policy was envisaged as increasing the regular income of the Crown, much former monastic property was sold off to fund Henry's military campaigns in the 1540s, he was given the authority to do this in England and Wales by the Act of Supremacy, passed by Parliament in 1534, which made him Supreme Head of the Church in England, thus separating England from Papal authority, by the First Suppression Act and the Second Suppression Act. Professor George W. Bernard argues: The dissolution of the monasteries in the late 1530s was one of the most revolutionary events in English history. There were nearly 900 religious houses in England, around 260 for monks, 300 for regular canons, 142 nunneries and 183 friaries.
If the adult male population was 500,000, that meant that one adult man in fifty was in religious orders. At the time of their suppression, a small number of English and Welsh religious houses could trace their origins to Anglo-Saxon or Celtic foundations before the Norman Conquest, but the overwhelming majority of the 625 monastic communities dissolved by Henry VIII had developed in the wave of monastic enthusiasm that had swept western Christendom in the 11th and 12th centuries. Few English houses had been founded than the end of the 13th century. 11th- and 12th-century founders had endowed monastic houses with both'temporal' income in the form of revenues from landed estates, and'spiritual' income in the form of tithes appropriated from parish churches under the founder's patronage. In consequence of this, religious houses in the 16th century controlled appointment to about two-fifths of all parish benefices in England, disposed of about half of all ecclesiastical income, owned around a quarter of the nation's landed wealth.
An English medieval proverb said that if the Abbot of Glastonbury married the Abbess of Shaftesbury, the heir would have more land than the King of England. The 200 houses of friars in England and Wales constituted a second distinct wave of foundations all occurring in the 13th century. Friaries, for the most part, were concentrated in urban areas. Unlike monasteries, friaries had eschewed income-bearing endowments; the Dissolution of the Monasteries in England and Ireland took place in the political context of other attacks on the ecclesiastical institutions of Western Roman Catholicism, under way for some time. Many of these were related to the Protestant Reformation in Continental Europe. By the end of the 16th century, monasticism had entirely disappeared from those European states whose rulers had adopted Lutheran or Reformed confessions of faith, they continued, albeit in reduced numbers and radically changed forms, in those states that remained Catholic. But, the religious and political changes in England under Henry VIII and Edward VI were of a different nature from those taking place in Germany, France and Geneva.
Across much of continental Europe, the seizure of monastic property was associated with mass discontent among the common people and the lower level of clergy and civil society against powerful and wealthy ecclesiastical institutions. Such popular hostility against the church was rare in England before 1558; these changes were met with widespread popular suspicion. Dissatisfaction with the general state of regular religious life, with the gross extent of monastic wealth, was near to universal amongst late medieval secular and ecclesiastical rulers in the Latin West. Bernard says there was widespread concern in the 15th and early 16th centuries about the condition of the monasteries. A leading figure here is the scholar and theologian Desiderius Erasmus who satirized monasteries as lax, as comfortably worldly, as wasteful of scarce resources, as superstitious. At that time, quite a few bishops across Europe had come to believe that resources expensively deployed on an unceasing round of services by men and women in theory set apart from the world be better spent on endowing grammar schools and university colleges to train men who would serve the laity as parish priests, on reforming the antiquated structures of over-large dioceses such as that of Lincoln.
Pastoral care was seen as much more important and vital than the monastic focus on contemplation and performance of the daily office. Erasmus had made a threefold criticism of the monks and nuns of his day, saying that: in withdrawing from the world into their own communal life, they elevated man-made monastic vows of poverty and obedience above the God-given vows of sacramental
Fortification
A fortification is a military construction or building designed for the defense of territories in warfare, is used to solidify rule in a region during peacetime. The term is derived from the Latin fortis and facere. From early history to modern times, walls have been necessary for cities to survive in an ever-changing world of invasion and conquest; some settlements in the Indus Valley Civilization were the first small cities to be fortified. In ancient Greece, large stone walls had been built in Mycenaean Greece, such as the ancient site of Mycenae. A Greek phrourion was a fortified collection of buildings used as a military garrison, is the equivalent of the Roman castellum or English fortress; these constructions served the purpose of a watch tower, to guard certain roads and lands that might threaten the kingdom. Though smaller than a real fortress, they acted as a border guard rather than a real strongpoint to watch and maintain the border; the art of setting out a military camp or constructing a fortification traditionally has been called "castrametation" since the time of the Roman legions.
Fortification is divided into two branches: permanent fortification and field fortification. There is an intermediate branch known as semi-permanent fortification. Castles are fortifications which are regarded as being distinct from the generic fort or fortress in that they are a residence of a monarch or noble and command a specific defensive territory. Roman forts and hill forts were the main antecedents of castles in Europe, which emerged in the 9th century in the Carolingian Empire; the Early Middle Ages saw the creation of some towns built around castles. Medieval-style fortifications were made obsolete by the arrival of cannons in the 14th century. Fortifications in the age of black powder evolved into much lower structures with greater use of ditches and earth ramparts that would absorb and disperse the energy of cannon fire. Walls exposed to direct cannon fire were vulnerable, so the walls were sunk into ditches fronted by earth slopes to improve protection; the arrival of explosive shells in the 19th century led to yet another stage in the evolution of fortification.
Star forts did not fare well against the effects of high explosive, the intricate arrangements of bastions, flanking batteries and the constructed lines of fire for the defending cannon could be disrupted by explosive shells. Steel-and-concrete fortifications were common during the early 20th centuries; however the advances in modern warfare since World War I have made large-scale fortifications obsolete in most situations. Demilitarized zones along borders are arguably another type of fortification, although a passive kind, providing a buffer between hostile militaries. Many US military installations are known as forts. Indeed, during the pioneering era of North America, many outposts on the frontiers non-military outposts, were referred to generically as forts. Larger military installations may be called fortresses; the word fortification can refer to the practice of improving an area's defence with defensive works. City walls are fortifications but are not called fortresses; the art of setting out a military camp or constructing a fortification traditionally has been called castrametation since the time of the Roman legions.
The art/science of laying siege to a fortification and of destroying it is called siegecraft or siege warfare and is formally known as poliorcetics. In some texts this latter term applies to the art of building a fortification. Fortification is divided into two branches: permanent fortification and field fortification. Permanent fortifications are erected at leisure, with all the resources that a state can supply of constructive and mechanical skill, are built of enduring materials. Field fortifications—for example breastworks—and known as fieldworks or earthworks, are extemporized by troops in the field assisted by such local labour and tools as may be procurable and with materials that do not require much preparation, such as earth and light timber, or sandbags. An example of field fortification was the construction of Fort Necessity by George Washington in 1754. There is an intermediate branch known as semi-permanent fortification; this is employed when in the course of a campaign it becomes desirable to protect some locality with the best imitation of permanent defences that can be made in a short time, ample resources and skilled civilian labour being available.
An example of this is the construction of Roman forts in England and in other Roman territories where camps were set up with the intention of staying for some time, but not permanently. Castles are fortifications which are regarded as being distinct from the generic fort or fortress in that it describes a residence of a monarch or noble and commands a specific defensive territory. An example of this is the massive medieval castle of Carcassonne. From early history to modern times, walls have been a necessity for many cities. In Bulgaria, near the town of Provadia a walled fortified settlement today called Solnitsata starting from 4700 BC had a diameter of about 300 feet, was home to 350 people living in two-storey houses, was encircled by a fortified wall; the huge walls around the settlement, which were built tall and with stone blocks which are 6 feet high and 4.5 feet thick, make it one of the earliest walled settlements in Europe but it is younger than the walled town of Sesklo in Greece from 6800 BC.
Uruk in ancient Su
Vikings
Vikings were Norse seafarers speaking the Old Norse language, who during the late 8th to late 11th centuries and traded from their Northern European homelands across wide areas of Europe, explored westwards to Iceland and Vinland. The term is commonly extended in modern English and other vernaculars to the inhabitants of Norse home communities during what has become known as the Viking Age; this period of Nordic military and demographic expansion constitutes an important element in the early medieval history of Scandinavia, the British Isles, Kievan Rus' and Sicily. Facilitated by advanced sailing and navigational skills, characterised by the longship, Viking activities at times extended into the Mediterranean littoral, North Africa, the Middle East. Following extended phases of exploration and settlement, Viking communities and governments were established in diverse areas of north-western Europe, Belarus and European Russia, the North Atlantic islands and as far as the north-eastern coast of North America.
This period of expansion witnessed the wider dissemination of Norse culture, while introducing strong foreign cultural influences into Scandinavia itself, with profound developmental implications in both directions. Popular, modern conceptions of the Vikings—the term applied casually to their modern descendants and the inhabitants of modern Scandinavia—often differ from the complex picture that emerges from archaeology and historical sources. A romanticised picture of Vikings as noble savages began to emerge in the 18th century. Perceived views of the Vikings as alternatively violent, piratical heathens or as intrepid adventurers owe much to conflicting varieties of the modern Viking myth that had taken shape by the early 20th century. Current popular representations of the Vikings are based on cultural clichés and stereotypes, complicating modern appreciation of the Viking legacy; these representations are not always accurate — for example, there is no evidence that they wore horned helmets.
One etymology derives víking from the feminine vík, meaning "creek, small bay". Various theories have been offered that the word viking may be derived from the name of the historical Norwegian district of Viken, meaning "a person from Viken". According to this theory, the word described persons from this area, it is only in the last few centuries that it has taken on the broader sense of early medieval Scandinavians in general. However, there are a few major problems with this theory. People from the Viken area were not called'Viking' in Old Norse manuscripts, but are referred to as víkverir,'Vík dwellers'. In addition, that explanation could explain only the masculine and ignore the feminine, a serious problem because the masculine is derived from the feminine but hardly vice versa; the form occurs as a personal name on some Swedish runestones. The stone of Tóki víking was raised in memory of a local man named Tóki who got the name Tóki víking because of his activities as a viking; the Gårdstånga Stone uses the phrase "ÞeR drængaR waRu wiða unesiR i wikingu", referring to the stone's dedicatees as vikings.
The Västra Strö 1 Runestone has an inscription in memory of a Björn, killed when "i viking". In Sweden there is a locality known since the middle ages as Vikingstad; the Bro Stone was risen in memory of Assur, said to have protected the land from vikings. There is little indication of any negative connotation in the term before the end of the Viking Age. Another etymology, one that gained support in the early twenty-first century, derives Viking from the same root as Old Norse vika, f.'sea mile', originally'the distance between two shifts of rowers', from the root *weik or *wîk, as in the Proto-Germanic verb *wîkan,'to recede'. This is found in the Proto-Nordic verb *wikan,'to turn', similar to Old Icelandic víkja'to move, to turn', with well-attested nautical usages. Linguistically, this theory is better attested, the term most predates the use of the sail by the Germanic peoples of North-Western Europe, because the Old Frisian spelling shows that the word was pronounced with a palatal k and thus in all probability existed in North-Western Germanic before that palatalisation happened, that is, in the 5th century or before.
In that case, the idea behind it seems to be that the tired rower moves aside for the rested rower on the thwart when he relieves him. The Old Norse feminine víking may have been a sea journey characterised by the shifting of rowers, i.e. a long-distance sea journey, because in the pre-sail era, the shifting of rowers would distinguish long-distance sea journeys. A víkingr would originally have been a participant on a sea journey characterised by the shifting of rowers. In that case, the word Viking was not connected to Scandinavian seafarers but assumed this meaning when the Scandinavians begun to dominate the seas. In Old English, the word wicing appears first in the Anglo-Saxon poem, which dates from the 9th century. In Old English, in the history of the archbishops of Hamburg-Bremen written by Adam of Bremen in about 1070, the term referred to Scandi
Sir Charles Palmer, 1st Baronet
Sir Charles Mark Palmer, 1st Baronet was an English shipbuilder born in South Shields, County Durham, England. He was a Liberal Party politician and Member of Parliament, his father the captain of a whaler, moved in 1828 to Newcastle upon Tyne, where he owned a ship owning and ship-broking business. At the age of 15 Charles Palmer entered a shipping business in the city. After six months, he travelled to Marseilles, where his father had procured him a post in a large commercial house, at the same time entrusting him with the local agency of his own business. After two years experience in Marseilles he entered his father's business in Newcastle, in 1842 he became a partner, his business capacity attracted the attention of a leading local colliery owner, he was appointed manager of the Marley Hill colliery in which he became a partner in 1846. Subsequently he was made one of the managers of the associated collieries north and south of the Tyne owned by Lord Ravensworth, Lord Wharncliffe, the marquess of Bute and Lord Strathmore.
Using the profits of the Marley Hill colliery, he purchased the properties of his erstwhile employer, while he developed the established coke trade, obtaining the coke contracts for several of the large English and continental railways. About 1850 the question of coal-transport to the London market became a serious question for north country colliery proprietors. Palmer therefore built according to his own plans, the John Bowes, the first iron screw collier, several other steam-colliers, in a yard established by him at Jarrow a small Tyneside village, he purchased iron mines in Yorkshire and erected large shipbuilding yards along the Tyne at Jarrow, including blast-furnaces, steel-works, rolling-mills and engine works, all on a massive scale. The firm produced warships as well as merchant vessels, its system of rolling armour plates, introduced in 1856, was adopted by other builders. In 1865 he turned the business into Iron Company Limited. In 1868 Palmer raised a new unit in the Volunteer Force, the 1st Durham Engineer Volunteers at Jarrow, he was commissioned as Lieutenant-Colonel Commandant.
The 1st Durham EV merged with the smaller 1st Newcastle EV as the 1st Newcastle upon Tyne and Durham EV, with Palmer as commanding officer. Palmer retired from the Volunteers in 1888 with the rank of Colonel; the same year, the 1st Newcastle & Durham was split into three separate units: the 1st Durham Royal Engineers, at Jarrow, the Tyne Division RE, Submarine Miners at North Shields, with Palmer as Honorary Commandant of both units, together with a new 1st Newcastle upon Tyne RE. Palmer's younger brother, Alfred Septimus Palmer, a Newcastle mining engineer, a major in the 1st Newcastle and Durham, became commanding officer of the third unit. At the 1874 general election, Palmer was elected as Liberal Party Member of Parliament for North Durham, held the seat until its abolition for the 1885 general election, he was elected for the new Jarrow constituency, sat for the constituency until his death in London in 1907. Palmer was in 1902 President of the Gateshead Chamber of Commerce. In 1886, Palmer's services in connection with the settlement of the costly dispute between British ship-owners and the Suez Canal Company were rewarded with a baronetcy, as Sir Charles Palmer, 1st Baronet of Grinkle Park, County York.
Palmer married, firstly, on 29 July 1846, daughter of Ebenezer Robson of Newcastle. They had two sons: George Robson Palmer 2nd Baronet Alfred Molyneux Palmer 3rd Baronet Jane Palmer died on 6 April 1865. Palmer married, secondly, on 4 July 1867, Augusta Mary, daughter of Alfred Lambert, of Paris and Massa di Carraca, Italy, they had two further sons: Lt-Col Claude Bowes Palmer, CBE, Royal Army Medical Corps Capt Lionel Hugo Palmer, 3rd Bn West Yorkshire Regiment and Royal North West Mounted Police, Canada Augusta Palmer died 2 December 1875. Palmer married, thirdly, on 17 February 1877, daughter of James Montgomrey of Brentford, Middlesex, they had two children: Major Godfrey Mark Palmer, MP for Jarrow Hilda Gertrude Montgomerie Palmer Sir Charles Palmer died on 4 June 1907, when he was succeeded in the baronetcy by his eldest son. Gertrude, Lady Palmer, died on 21 January 1918; this article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed.. "Palmer, Sir Charles Mark".
Encyclopædia Britannica. 20. Cambridge University Press. Burke's Baronetage. Maj O. M. Short, Maj H. Sherlock, Capt L. E. C. M. Perowne and Lt M. A. Fraser, The History of the Tyne Electrical Engineers, Royal Engineers, 1884–1933, 1933/Uckfield: Naval & Military, nd, ISBN 1-845747-96-8. R. A. Westlake, Royal Engineers 1859–1908, Wembley: R. A. Westlake, 1983, ISBN 0-9508530-0-3. Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by Sir Charles Palmer Land Forces of Britain, the Empire and Commonwealth
Fire services in the United Kingdom
The fire services in the United Kingdom operate under separate legislative and administrative arrangements in England and Wales, Northern Ireland, Scotland. Emergency cover is provided by over fifty agencies; these are known as a fire and rescue service, the term used in modern legislation and by government departments. The older terms of fire brigade and fire service survive in informal usage and in the names of a few organisations. England and Wales have local fire services which are each overseen by a fire authority, made up of representatives of local governments. Fire authorities have the power to raise a Council Tax levy for funding, with the remainder coming from the government. Scotland and Northern Ireland have centralised fire services, so their authorities are committees of the devolved parliaments; the total budget for fire services in 2014-15 was £2.9 billion. Central government maintains national standards and a body of independent advisers through the Chief Fire and Rescue Adviser, created in 2007, while Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services provides direct oversight.
The devolved government in Scotland has HMFSI Scotland. Firefighters in the United Kingdom are allowed to join unions, the main one being the Fire Brigades Union, while chief fire officers are members of the National Fire Chiefs Council, which has some role in national co-ordination; the fire services have undergone significant changes since the beginning of the 21st century, a process, propelled by a devolution of central government powers, new legislation and a change to operational procedures in the light of terrorism attacks and threats. See separate article History of fire safety legislation in the United Kingdom Comprehensive list of recent UK fire and rescue service legislation: Fire services are established and granted their powers under new legislation which has replaced a number of Acts of Parliament dating back more than 60 years, but is still undergoing change. 1938: Fire Brigades Act 1938. This Act provided for centralised co-ordination of fire brigades in Great Britain and made it mandatory for local authorities to arrange an effective fire service.
1947: Fire Services Act 1947 This Act transferred the functions of the National Fire Service to local authorities. Now repealed in England and Wales by Schedule 2 of the Fire and Rescue Services Act 2004. 1959: Fire Services Act 1959 This Act amended the 1947 Act. It was repealed in Wales along with the 1947 Act. 1999: Greater London Authority Act 1999 This act was necessary to allow for the formation of the Greater London Authority and in turn the London Fire and Emergency Planning Authority. In 2002, there was a series of national fire strikes, with much of the discontent caused by the aforementioned report into the fire service conducted by Prof Sir George Bain. In December 2002, the Independent Review of the Fire Service was published with the industrial action still ongoing. Bain's report led to a change in the laws relating to firefighting. 2002: Independent Review of the Fire Service published 2004: Fire and Rescue Services Act 2004 only applying to England and Wales. 2006: The Regulatory Reform Order 2005 This piece of secondary legislation or statutory instrument replaces several other acts that dealt with fire precautions and fire safety in premises, including the now defunct process of issuing fire certificates.
It came into force on 1 October 2006. The DfCLG has published a set of guides for non-domestic premises: 2006: The Government of Wales Act 2006 gave the National Assembly for Wales powers to pass laws on "Fire and rescue services. Promotion of fire safety otherwise than by prohibition or regulation." But does not prevent future legislation being passed by the UK government which applies to two or more constituent countries. There are further plans to modernise the fire service according to the Local Government Association, its website outlines future changes, specific projects: "The aim of the Fire Modernisation Programme is to adopt modern work practices within the Fire & Rescue Service to become more efficient and effective, while strengthening the contingency and resilience of the Service to react to incidents. " The fire service in England and Wales is scrutinised by a House of Commons select committee. In June 2006, the fire and rescue service select committee, under the auspices of the Communities and Local Government Committee, published its latest report.
Committee report The committee's brief is described on its website: The Communities and Local Government Committee is appointed by the House of Commons to examine the expenditure and policy of the Department for Communities and Local Government and its associated bodies. Government response This document, the subsequent government response in September 2006, are important as they outlined progress on the FiReControl, efforts to address diversity and the planned closure of HMFSI in 2007 among many issues. Both documents are interesting as they refer back to Professor Bain's report and the many recommendations it made and continue to put forward the notion that there is an ongoing need to modernise FRSs. For example, where FRSs were inspected by HMFSI, much of this work is now carried out by the National Audit Office. Fire Control On 8 February 2010 the House of Commons Communities and Local Governm
Wuppertal in Germany, originally twinned with South Shields in 1951.
Noisy-le-Sec in France, originally twinned with Hebburn in April 1963.
