The LWF Blog
Fire Safety for Facilities Management Personnel – Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 – Part 27
January 6, 2020 2:41 pmLawrence 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 26, LWF discussed the duties of the Responsible Person (RP) in relation to the fire safety duties required. In part 27, we continue looking at the fire safety duties required by the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 (RRFSO or the Order).
In order to identify the fire safety duties required to be carried out, a fire risk assessment must be made of the premises and should be reviewed regularly. This stipulation applies to all organizations where five or more employees are engaged.
In a business where one or more young persons are employed, whether they are paid employees or interns/volunteers, the fire risk assessment should take particular note of the matters in Part 2 of Schedule 1 of the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005, which states
‘MATTERS TO BE TAKEN INTO PARTICULAR ACCOUNT IN RISK ASSESSMENT IN RESPECT OF YOUNG PERSONS
The matters are
(a) the inexperience, lack of awareness of risks and immaturity of young persons;
(b) the fitting-out and layout of the premises;
(c) the nature, degree and duration of exposure to physical and chemical agents;
(d) the form, range, and use of work equipment and the way in which it is handled;
(e) the organisation of processes and activities;
(f) the extent of the safety training provided or to be provided to young persons; and
(g) risks from agents, processes and work listed in the Annex to Council Directive 94/33/EC(1) on the protection of young people at work.’
With this in mind, no young person shall be employed unless the Responsible Person has made or reviewed the fire risk assessment to take account of the above matters.
Where preventative and protective measures are taken, the Responsible Person should do so on the basis of the ‘principles of prevention’, which is set out in Part 3 of Schedule 1 of the RRFSO.
(a) avoiding risks;
(b) evaluating the risks that cannot be avoided;
(c) combating the risks at source;
(d) adapting to technical progress;
(e) replacing the dangerous by the non-dangerous or less dangerous;
(f) developing a coherent overall prevention policy, which covers technology,
organization of work and the influence of factors relating to the working
environment;
g) giving collective protective measures priority over individual protective
measures;
h) giving appropriate instructions to employees.’
In part 28, LWF will begin to look at means of escape as per the RRFSO. 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.