FIFE COUNCIL are set to spend £2.3 million on fire alarm upgrades at 64 of its schools.

The local authority will dish out £560,000 in the West Fife area as measures are taken to introduce automatic alarms at 19 sites.

Alan Paterson, service manager, confirmed: "In West Fife, three fire alarm systems upgrades are complete.

"We’re on site for another three with one about to start and 12 are planned or at design stage."

The council hope that all installations across the Kingdom will be completed by 2021/22.

Cairneyhill Primary School went up in flames nearly two years ago and concerns were raised immediately over fire safety.

In the council’s older schools, such as Cairneyhill, which was built in 1981, fire alert devices are operated manually and not linked to the fire service.

It means if there’s no-one there – such as in the evenings, at weekends and during school holidays – to break the glass physically and phone 999, the alarm is not raised.

Fife Council have moved to address this and are committed to spending more than £2m on the automatic upgrades.

Mr Paterson updated councillors sitting on the assets and corporate services committee last month on the improvements as well as other fire safety measures, including how schools and its pupils should response to false alarms.

He said: "The number of Unwanted Fire Alarm Signals (UFAS) attended by the fire service has increased over the past year and continued high levels of false alarms could ultimately lead to a response to 999 calls only.

"This rise can be attributed to the increased number of premises connected to alarm-receiving centres and the upgrade programme increasing coverage of detection, particularly in schools.

"Fife Council is committed to reducing false alarms and has implemented a management procedure outlining our approach to minimising false alarms, including arrangements for the alarm-receiving call centre to challenge automatic calls before passing to the Fire Service.

"UFAS incidents are now reviewed monthly and all incidents are investigated to determine the cause and recommend remedial action where appropriate.

"To support this process, a new evacuation procedure has been issued to schools with instructions for responding to false alarms."

Mr Paterson's report also highlighted that the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service had completed more than 120 audits of Fife Council with no significant failings in the past year.