The Lancashire Fire and Rescue Service issued fewer fire safety notices about buildings last year, new figures show – despite a national increase.

It comes as the Fire Brigades Union (FBU) said decades of deregulation and complacency have created a "crisis in building safety", and just days after the final report from the Grenfell Inquiry was published.

Figures from the Home Office show 2,217 fire safety inspections or audits were carried out by the Lancashire Fire and Rescue Service in the year to March.

Of these, 109 resulted in a formal notification, which is issued in the most serious of cases or where fire safety non-compliance was raised previously but was not resolved.

It was down from 135 notices the year before.

Across England, 2,823 formal notices were issued last year, the highest since 2012-13.

Matt Wrack, FBU general secretary said: "Decades of deregulation and complacency have created a crisis in building safety.

"Ignored warnings result in tragedies, as we saw with the Grenfell Tower fire."

He added: "Deregulation has been the dominant ideology in Westminster, driven by the lobbying of private business interests.

"Meanwhile, fire safety has been hit by brutal cuts with fewer inspectors and overstretched resources."

He said the Government must rebuild the UK’s fire safety regime and "fix the building safety crisis".

Of the formal notices handed out across England last year, 446 were for purpose-built flat buildings. This included eight notices in Lancashire.

Meanwhile, dozens were for hospitals, public buildings and schools.

In Lancashire, two formal notices went to hospitals.

The figures also show there were 43 prosecutions in serious cases on non-compliance, a significant jump from 24 the year before.

There was one prosecution in Lancashire last year.

A Government spokesperson said: "It is vital that people feel safe in their homes. Fire and rescue authorities enforce the necessary fire safety legislation and when building owners fail to comply, this can include pursuing prosecution.

"We will take action to improve building safety, including accelerating cladding remediation and holding those responsible for safety issues to account."

The figures come at the same time as others show the workforce at the fire service in Lancashire has shrunk by a fifth since 2010.

The FBU said firefighters are being asked to do more with less.

Matt Wrack said: "Fourteen years of austerity have devastated the fire and rescue service. Every region has been hit, with 12,000 firefighters lost to cuts across the UK.

"999 response times are slower than ever before, putting homes and lives at risk.

"To protect the public, Labour must invest in the fire and rescue service as a matter of urgency."