The LWF Blog

Fire Safety for Facilities Management Personnel – Fire Safety Regulations in Scotland – Part 47

May 26, 2020 12:17 pm

Lawrence Webster Forrest (LWF) is a specialist fire engineering and fire risk management consultancy whose aim is to give information on best practice in fire safety for facilities management personnel through this blog series. In part 46, LWF began to consider the dutyholders and competent persons under Scottish legislation. In part 47, we will continue looking at dutyholders in Scottish fire legislation.

The Scottish fire safety legislation – Part 3 of the Fire (Scotland) Act 2005 and Fire Safety (Scotland) Regulations 2006 requires the nomination of competent persons to assist in implementing fire procedures and the nomination of persons, as necessary, to use fire-fighting equipment. These requirements are in common with those laid out in the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 in England and Wales.

There is also similarity in that in both sets of legislation, there is a requirement for a competent person to assist the employer in implementing relevant measures or duties, but in the Scottish legislation, this competent person must be ‘nominated’ by the person with duties under Section 53 or 54 of the Fire (Scotland) Act. The person must assist in undertaking measures necessary to comply with the Chapter 1 duties.

This differs from the situation in England and Wales, where under the Fire Safety Order, the person must be ‘appointed’ to assist the responsible person in undertaking preventative and protective measures. Whether nomination or appointment differ in weight or context is perhaps irrelevant, as under each regime, a person is required to assist.

The relevant persons referred to in the Scottish legislation as those persons who must be protected from fire are subject to the same definition and requirements as those referred to in the Fire Safety Order in England and Wales. A relevant person in each case is one who is or may be in the vicinity of the premises and whose safety would be at risk in the event of a fire on the premises. This definition does not include on-duty firefighters who are carrying out operational tasks in either country’s remit.

In part 48, LWF will begin to look at fire safety measures, including how the terms used in this area in Scottish legislation differs from those in England and Wales. In the meantime, if you have any queries about your own facilities or wish to discuss this blog series, please contact LWF on freephone 0800 410 1130.

Lawrence Webster Forrest is a fire engineering consultancy based in Surrey with over 25 years’ experience, which provides a wide range of consultancy services to professionals involved in the design, development and construction and operation of buildings.

While care has been taken to ensure that information contained in LWF’s publications is true and correct at the time of publication, changes in circumstances after the time of publication may impact on the accuracy of this information.