The Trouble With Chairs

Those of you with long memories may recall that I wrote about Greater Manchester fire service's rather strange chair edict last year.

You don't?

Oh well, let me refresh your memory.

Lats year Nanny's chums in the Greater Manchester Fire Service drew up a four-page safety manual, to instruct crews on how to sit in a reclining chair.

The story, as the old saying goes, doesn't end there...dear me no!

On the normal 15-hour night shift, firemen are allotted time to rest between emergencies and running through their training drills.

They are allowed to have a rest for up to three hours, but they are not allowed to go to sleep...errrr work that one out?

Those who work for the Greater Manchester fire service have been instructed that they can only rest in prescribed reclining chairs, only after they have been trained to use them of course.

It doesn't stop there.

It would seem that 3 "very naughty", but highly experienced firemen, are facing disciplinary action.

What was their crime?

Being drunk on duty?

No!

Being unfit to perform their duties?

No!

Being bolshy?

No!

Their crime was...wait for it...wait for it..."involvement in the use of unauthorised rest facilities".

The "naughty three" found it to be more to sleep on the hard station floor, than on one of Nanny's £400 reclining chairs.

Nanny's fire chiefs are looking into claims that the "naughty three" defied orders to rest only on the £400 reclining chairs, which were installed as a replacements for beds in Greater Manchester's 41 fire stations last year.

They are accused of breaking regulations, by deciding it was more comfortable to use their own sleeping bags and bed down on the floor.

Not unsurprisingly the unions have described the policy as ridiculous, saying their members are being treated like children.

When the chairs were installed the firemen were also told that they could only use specially issued blankets, not their own bedding.

The "naughty three", including a watch commander, were found to have breached the reclining chair orders after a locker inspection found sleeping bags stashed away.

Director of human resources, Anita Wainwright, said...seemingly with a straight face:

"Risk-assessed facilities have been provided

for rest only, not sleep.

However, if a firefighter were to doze off on the

rest facilities provided, a common sense approach is adopted."

"Risk assessed facilities"????

Whenever I hear the "risk assessment" phrase, I instinctively reach for my sick bag.

Why can't Nanny call a spade a spade?

Patronising Bullshit!

The firemen note that the chairs are not comfortable for a proper rest.

One is quoted as saying:

"This is bureaucracy gone barmy

We cannot use pillows on the chairs

and we cannot use our own blankets.

Airline blankets have been issued instead.

We do not mind being assessed on performance,

but being spied on like this leaves a nasty taste."

One day, Nanny's own house might burn down...who will rush to rescue her then?

How To Sit In a Reclining Chair

Now I know that many of you happily live your lives, in a care free and relaxed manner, without ever giving a thought to the dangers that lurk in every corner of your existence.

However, don't panic, Nanny spends the most part of her life worrying about these dangers on our behalf.

Thank you Nanny!

Indeed she has recently identified another, previously considered "harmless", activity that urgently needs the "Nanny treatment".

Sitting in reclining chairs, it seems, is very dangerous.

Therefore Nanny's chums in the Greater Manchester Fire Service have drawn up a four-page safety manual to instruct crews on how to sit in a reclining chair.

Firemen, you might recall, are those brave ladies and gentlemen who risk life and limb on our behalf putting out fires and rescuing people from burning buildings.

You would have thought that they had a healthy appreciation of risk; Nanny thinks otherwise.

Those firemen from Manchester hoping for a rest between call-outs are banned from doing so, until they have been trained to use the fireservice's new £400 reclining chair.

This may take some time, however, since Greater Manchester Fire Service employs 2,200 personnel in 41 stations.

The instructions for sitting down are as follows:

Take out their "personal-issue head protector", and place it on the back of the chair.

Then, and only then, can they begin their descent, a process that must end with them sitting "fully back". Those that get this far can "get ready to recline".

The manual then advises:

"To release the mechanism (i.e. to start reclining), simply lift the lever under the right-hand arm of the chair (when seated).

This moves the chair into its semi-reclined position (i.e. feet up, head up)."

To recline the chair fully, they must hold on to the arm rests and push backwards.

To "upright" [sic] the chair, the occupant "should sit up slightly into the semi-reclined position, hold on to the armrest then press downwards with their heels until the action locks the chair flush".

Crews are warned that only "trained personnel" can carry out "lubrication of mechanisms", and that sleeping bags must not be used.

They are also given advice on how to deal with spillages - "tissue should firstly be placed on the stain to absorb excess liquid" - and warned that horseplay involving recliners is deemed a disciplinary offence.

The fire service has spent £130,000 on new Calcot recliners, which will be used as beds during night shifts.

A fire service spokesman said:

"Training will be given for health and safety reasons.

There are moving parts."

I sit on a swivel chair when working, which I constructed myself; am I in danger?