Protection

A fire and rescue service must:

Identifying risk and gathering evidence

1. Identify and understand its risk profile related to the built environment, including premises they need to regulate, through its community risk management planning;
2. Carry out appropriate equality impact assessments with those responsible for keeping premises safe, to assist them in understanding how best to support vulnerable occupants, striving to ensure equality of safety provision;
3. Gather and maintain an accurate risk profile and supporting information about relevant premises in a manner that is compliant with legislation;
4. Make available information about premises to all employees who need it when required, allowing them to be informed, stay safe and effectively carry out their duties;
5. Ensure there is a mechanism for employees to feedback any new or emerging information or risks about buildings as a result of them carrying out their duties, to enable it to maintain an accurate risk profile;

Decision making, planning and deployment of resources

6. plan and deliver effective and robust protection activities to mitigate and reduce the risks identified through its community risk management planning in compliance with the Regulator’s Code and the principles of Better Regulation;
7. maintain an ability to deliver necessary statutory protection activities at all times;
8. plan and deliver engagement with those who are responsible for keeping relevant premises safe to provide advice and education in a constructive and helpful way on matters relating to fire safety, petroleum, and explosives legislation, including:
   • • working to reduce the number of Unwanted Fire Signals (UwFS) that are generated from premises protected by automatic fire detection and fire alarm systems; and
     • actively promoting and supporting Primary Authority Partnership schemes in compliance with relevant Primary Authority legislation, where appropriate.
9. respond to statutory and non-statutory consultations, where the service is a regulator, in a timely and appropriate way;
10. collaborate with fire and rescue services and other partners to deliver protection and enforcement activities in the most efficient and effective way possible;

Training, competence and capacity

11. recruit, train, develop and maintain a competent and professional protection workforce by
    • • adopting the Competency Framework for Fire Safety Regulators (the framework), where relevant to the role and embedding it into local policies, procedures, tailored guidance, and training materials; and
      • recording and monitoring competence.
12. have in place necessary succession planning and processes to maintain a sustainable competent protection workforce;
13. provide support to operational response employees and any other employees undertaking protection activities to build knowledge and understanding;

Evaluation and improvement

14. demonstrate how it monitors and evaluates the effectiveness, efficiency and impact of its protection activities; and
15. generate a culture which embraces national and organisational learning allowing it to identify and capture feedback from a range of sources; evaluate, share and act upon it to drive innovation and continuous improvement and enhance future performance;

A specific Fire Investigation Fire Standard is under development which will provide more detail. However, where Fire Investigation is managed within its protection function, a fire and rescue service must:

16. investigate, report on and learn from the cause and behaviour of fires, working with others when appropriate.

Where Petroleum or Explosives regulation is managed within its protection function, a fire and rescue service must:

17. investigate, report on and learn from causes of petroleum and explosives related incidents.

To support this Fire Standard, a fire and rescue service should:

18. Maximise opportunities gained from supporting the National Fire Chiefs Council (NFCC) network by sharing learning and experiences, collaborating with others and contributing to the continual improvement of fire protection activities;
19. Contribute and support national campaigns and initiatives, where appropriate and where resources are available.

• Code of Ethics Fire Standard
• Community Risk Management Planning Fire Standard
• Apprenticeships
  • Fire Safety Advisor
  • Fire Safety Inspector
  • Fire Safety Engineer
• Fire Investigation Fire Standard (Link will be added when published)
• Prevention Fire Standard

For all buildings regulated under the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005:

• Non-Fire Safety Specialist personnel – appropriate fire safety training
• Fire Safety Advisor – Level 3 Certificate in Fire Safety
• Fire Safety Inspector – Level 4 Diploma in Fire Safety
• Fire Safety Competent Manager – Level 4 Diploma in Fire Safety
• Fire Engineering Design Technician – Level 5 Diploma in Fire Safety Engineering Design
• Fire Safety Engineer – Level 6 Degree in Fire Safety Engineering and/or MSc/MEng in Fire Safety Engineering
• Senior Fire Safety Engineer – Level 7 MSc/MEng in Fire Safety Engineering (or equivalent) and Chartered Engineer with the Engineering Council.

For Higher Risk Premises:

• Fire Safety Inspector – Level 4 Diploma in Fire Safety and relevant registration with a professional body
• Fire Safety Competent Manager – Level 4 Diploma in Fire Safety and relevant registration with a professional body
• Fire Engineering Design Technician – Level 5 Diploma in Fire Engineering Design and registration as an Engineering Technician with the Engineering Council.
• Fire Safety Engineer – Level 6 Degree in Fire Engineering and/or MSc/MEng in Fire Engineering and actively working towards Incorporated or Chartered Engineer with the Engineering Council.