Fire Safety
Duty to Carry Out a Fire Risk Assessment
The Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 (known as the FSO) introduced duties regarding fire safety in the common areas of HMOs, flats and maisonettes. The task is placed on the responsible person, who must carry out a fire risk assessment and take specific action to minimise fire risk in the common parts. Section 1 of the Fire Safety Act 2021 commenced in Wales on 1 October 2021. It has always been a requirement that the common areas of flats require a risk assessment. Still, the relationship between buildings without common areas and the individual apartments has been clarified.
'Responsible person' means 'the person who has control of the premises in connection with the carrying on a trade, business or other undertaking'. In practice, this will usually be the landlord. Still, in the case of absentee landlords where the 'carrying on of the business' is undertaken by a managing agent, it may be the managing agent.
Where a house is let on a single tenancy, a risk assessment is not required under the legislation. However, if a building contains two or more dwellings, the fire safety order will apply. In addition to the common parts, the 2021 amendments now clarify that even if the building has no common parts, a fire risk assessment is still required. The evaluation should include the structure and external walls (including doors and windows on those walls) and anything attached to the walls, including balconies, cladding fixings etc. This will mean a house converted into two self-contained flats, each with a door straight off the street, will need a risk assessment.
Whilst the individual dwellings remain outside this legislation (but not outside fire safety under the Housing, Health and Safety Rating System), any door from a dwelling into a common area (or to the outside) is now within the new requirements and should be included in the risk assessment.
These provisions are enforced by fire and rescue authorities, and there is, therefore, a dual enforcement regime in place in multi-occupancy premises. A Fire Safety Protocol has been established to avoid duplication and the potential for conflict as a framework for joint working arrangements between the fire and rescue authorities and local authorities.
LGA (formerly LACORS) National Fire Safety Guidance
In July 2008, the Local Authorities Co-ordinator of Regulatory Services (LACORS) issued national fire safety guidance for landlords and local authorities in England. As Welsh statutory fire safety requirements are very similar, the guidance may also be relevant in Wales.
Compliance with the guidance will satisfy landlords' legal requirements under the Fire Safety Order and is available here.
The guidance explains the general principles of fire safety and how to carry out and record a fire safety risk assessment.
Part D of the guidance provides valuable illustrations of the fire precautions suitable for the most common property types. The illustrations are based on properties being of average fire risk, and the guide explains the factors that determine normal risk.
In addition to HMOs, the guidance includes fire safety advice for single occupancy properties, and the Housing Act 2004 requires such properties to be fire safe.