“These must be banned, they kill people,” he says, pointing to a common household smoke detector.

Mr McGinn blames 1500 fire deaths a year in the United States on ionisation smoke detectors.

On top of this he adds 7500 “burned, maimed and disfigured” fire victims and “millions of affected family members”.

Joining him in Dubbo yesterday was World Fire Safety Foundation CEO Adrian Butler who estimated 95 per cent of the detectors in Australian homes were ionisation smoke alarms.

Mr McGinn labels them “flame detectors” because they are triggered by flames and heat rather than smoke.

“Those flaming fires rarely kill. It’s the smouldering fires, like a thief in the night, you have no idea that it’s even happening and it puts you to sleep and it kills,” he said.

“If we could wave a wand to get rid of all the ionisation detectors we would reduce fire deaths by half.”

The couple is calling for Australia to follow in the footsteps of “eight US cities” and five US states in outlawing the detectors, which are marginally cheaper than the alternative photoelectric alarms.

This type of alarm is designed to detect smoke or “smouldering fires”.

Both detectors meet current legal requirements for smoke alarms, however NSW Fire and Rescue (NSWFR) said it had been recommending photoelectric detectors “for years”.

“We have been for some years recommending installation of the photoelectric smoke alarm, a newer type that can respond faster than the ionisation alarm,” a NSWFR spokesman said.

“As an emergency services agency, we do not set legislation or related standards, but we do recommend people have the best available fire safety equipment to help prevent fires and save lives.”

The spokesman said there was “no doubt” ionisation alarms had saved lives since it became law to install smoke alarms in 2006.

Mr McGinn and Mr Butler, a former firefighter, urged authorities to take a harder line.

“Fire authorities in Australia don’t need to be recommending, they need to be saying ‘we need to ban the ionisation technology’ and that needs to happen at the legislative level,” Mr McGinn said.

When contacted by the Daily Liberal a spokesman for the Emergency Services Minister Mike Gallagher said it was the first time the issue had been raised with the new government.

Furthermore, the minister would “look into the matter” and investigate what costs would be associated with a move to photoelectric detectors.

Mr Butler claimed authorities were “petrified of the truth coming out” because they had been recommending the “fraudulent” detectors for years. Mr McGinn said he had been subject to a smear campaign in the US due to his attempts to get ionisation alarms banned in Albany where he was the local fire chief for 18 years.

Australia’s peak fire safety body said both detectors were effective but said photoelectric types were better to treat the “highest fire safety risk in residential buildings”.

“Ionisation smoke alarms are effective in detecting fast-flaming fires that contribute to some of the fire risk in residential buildings,” a statement from Fire Protection Association Australia said.

According to the association detectors were only one safety measure and “should not be relied upon as a single source of protection against the effects of fire”.