Fire safety management
Fire safety management is the domain that tests how a site organises, controls and assures fire safety; it is about duties, arrangements and review rather than a single control. In England and Wales the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 places the main duty on the responsible person - usually the employer, occupier or owner - to make a suitable and sufficient fire risk assessment and put fire safety arrangements in place. Scotland and Northern Ireland have equivalent duties under different legislation.
Core management rules
- Set a written fire safety policy and arrangements covering planning, organisation, control, monitoring and review (the PDCA cycle).
- Appoint competent persons, consult employees and safety representatives, and give information, instruction and training.
- Control contractors and hot work through induction, permits, isolation and fire watch.
- Prepare an emergency plan: warning, evacuation or stay-put decision, roll call, assembly point, PEEP for disabled people, and liaison with the fire and rescue service.
- Record significant findings, drills, tests and maintenance.
Monitoring and review
Monitor with daily checks of escape routes and extinguishers, weekly alarm tests and drills at planned intervals. Review the assessment after building changes, new processes, incidents, near misses or changes in occupancy.
Worked example. A 120-person warehouse adds high racking and employs a hot-work contractor. There is no permit and no fire watch. The management failure is not the lack of an extinguisher; it is failure to review the FRA after a change and to control the contractor. Corrective action: review the FRA, induct the contractor, issue a permit, isolate detection in the area, provide a fire watch during work and for a defined period after, check for smouldering, and update the emergency plan and drill.
Traps. Do not treat the fire risk assessment as a one-off document; do not assume the fire and rescue service writes the emergency plan; do not confuse a fire certificate with the current risk-assessment regime; do not omit PEEP or contractor control.