Councillor John Cottee, cabinet member for Communities at Nottinghamshire County Council talks about electrical blankets

Do you or someone you know own an electric blanket? – asked John Cottee, cabinet member for Communities at Nottinghamshire County Council.

As the weather turns colder, we know that many of you across Nottinghamshire may be switching on appliances such as electric blankets to get more heat into your homes but our question to you is when did you last check your blanket for signs of wear?

This December is the time to come along and get your electric blanket checked as our Trading Standards team are running three testing events across Nottinghamshire.

In 2022/23 there have been three fires in Nottinghamshire with causes attributed to electric blankets and sadly two of these resulted in fatalities.

If your electric blanket displays scorch marks, fraying fabric, exposed elements, damp patches loose connections, tie tapes that are damaged or missing or creasing and folding, our Trading Standards team wants you to bring them in for testing.

Electric blankets brought to the three events will be tested and replaced with a new one should they fail the safety testing. Any blankets which fail safety testing will not be handed back to residents.

If you don’t have an electric blanket yourself, we’d like you to think about your elderly relatives and neighbours and whether they may have a blanket that could be brought in for testing.

It is not worth the risk of using an older blanket which may be unsafe so I would urge anyone who owns an electric blanket to consider booking to come along to one of our events.

Sessions are available at Worksop Library on December 6, Bingham Library on December 7 and Mansfield fire station on December 8.

If you would like to book an appointment, you can do so by calling: 0115 804 4555.