asked the Secretary of State for Prices and Consumer Protection, in view of the increasing number of household fires resulting in the suffocation of occupants through the burning of Polyurethane foam, if she will issue advice, similar to Technical Data Note No. 29 (Rev) to all households on how to protect themselves from the unusually high burning rate and volume of heated smoke that occurs when polyurethane foam is ignited.

Technical Data Note 29 relates to precautions, particularly in relation to storage, to be taken in factories in which foamed plastics are manufactured, stored or worked in bulk. Advice of this kind for the comparatively small amounts of polyurethane foam likely to be present in the home would not serve any useful purpose. The Government and other bodies already promote a great deal of publicity on fire precautions in the home and on what to do if a fire occurs.