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IN EARLY 1997, a somewhat younger woman joined the Fire Protection Association (FPA) as the new editor of its membership magazine, Fire Prevention, and immediately got to work on FP297, the March 1997 issue. So, when starting work on this month’s issue of Fire Prevention & Fire Engineers Journal, it was something of a shock to note that the October 2005 issue (FP397) is, in fact, the 100th issue of the FPA magazine with which I have had the pleasure of being involved. And, although my connection with the Institution of Fire Engineers is not quite so enduring – with the merger of Fire Prevention and the Fire Engineers Journal taking place in January 2002 – I hope you will indulge me in a little nostalgia.
When I joined the FPA in 1997, the fire community had long been awaiting the introduction of the Fire Precautions (Workplace) Regulations, which were eventually enacted at the end of July, coming into effect on 1 December 1997. These Regulations introduced to the UK a risk-based approach to fire safety. It was also during 1997 that a Fire Safety Bill, drafted by the Fire Brigades Union, first received Ministerial support from then Home Office Minister George Howarth MP, who acknowledged the need for rationalisation and improvement in UK fire safety legislation. The year also saw the publication of the Safe as Houses report from the Community Fire Safety Task Force, which called for radical changes to the operation and culture of the fire service, by proposing that fire safety education should become its ‘primary focus’.
So, how far have we come since the heady days of 1997? The fire community is now eagerly awaiting the introduction of the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order. Due to hit the statute books in April 2006, the Fire Safety Order not only extends the risk-based approach to fire safety, but overhauls the entire legislative system, rationalising the range of Acts and Regulations that apply to fire safety and removing the fire certification process. As with the Workplace Regulations, the new legislation has been a long time coming. Promises that the regulatory reform process would offer a fast-track route to legislative change were soon shown to be unfounded, as the legislation was delayed time and again. The route to the Fire Safety Order has hence been just as long and tortuous as was the path to the Workplace Regulations.
Back in 1997, fire services were instructed to enforce the Workplace Regulations with a ‘light touch’. The guidance to the Regulations was slow in coming, and much criticised for being too complicated. As a result, some eight years later, many businesses are still in need of education in the basics of risk assessment. There are similar concerns over the guidance supporting the Fire Safety Order; the guidance to the new Order is yet to be released and early drafts have been much maligned for over-complicating the risk assessment process.
Changing culture
And what of the change in culture for the fire service? The Fire and Rescue Services Act 2004, which came into effect on 1 October 2004, introduced the most wide-ranging changes to fire and rescue services for over 50 years. The Act recognises the wider role of the service, placing a statutory duty on fire and rescue authorities to promote fire safety, as well as recognising that fire services have a duty to respond to incidents other than fire, including road traffic accidents, serious flooding and terrorist attacks.
The Act has been welcomed by most for finally offering brigades recognition for the services they have always provided as a matter of course. Similarly, placing a duty on brigades to promote fire safety has enabled them to put the many community safety initiatives with which they are involved on a more formal footing.
The Fire and Rescue Services Act also removed national standards of fire cover and extended the risk assessment approach to emergency response. Fire and rescue services are now required to produce integrated risk management plans, in which areas of high fire risk are recognised and appropriate resources made available to respond. While completing the circle by bringing together operational and fire safety issues may seem an entirely logical step to us today, it has taken some time to get to this point, and much is yet to be done.
So, it seems that 1997 did not just provide me with a new start in a vibrant and interesting industry, but was also the year when the fire safety modernisation process in the UK began in earnest. The introduction of the Workplace Regulations was only the first step in the long process of legislative reform, and I am sure the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order will not be the last.
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