Last Year I Could Not Spell Fire Risk Assessor; Now I Is One.
Recognition of the need to carry out a Fire Risk Assessment is variable. The qualifications and experience of persons carrying out the Fire Risk Assessments is variable. The quality of the outputs is variable and the cost of performing them is variable. If this analysis were to form part of a school report the typical phrase, 'could be better in all areas - 5/10', would be appropriate. Hardly the mark one would have wished to have seen in any review of a matter addressing life safety and of the imp
The recognition of the need to carry out a Fire Risk Assessment varies between 'no awareness at all' to a complete embracing of the process. Obviously those bodies which fit into the small and medium sized category are those that one would least expect to know of their need to carry one out. This is indeed the case, but it is worrying just how many of the larger medium sized enterprises are still unaware. Unfortunately, even those that do know they need to do a Fire Risk Assessment at sometime do not quite know by whom, when and how. Indeed, in some very large sectors, such as schools, there is still a high expectation that the Fire Service will carry out these Fire Risk Assessments for them. Also in the really small business sector there does appear to be a belief that it really doesn't apply to me, and if so, that the Fire Service will do it when they come to see if we have carried out our Fire Risk Assessment
Why is there such a lack of understanding as to the need? Could it be that the publicity for the system did not live up to the expectations of the fire safety industry? Most companies would have only received a single mailing of a fairly 'advertorial' type which could easily have been mistaken for promotional literature distributed by a fire prevention company. Most practitioners will probably admit to having heard at least one radio advert, but it is unlikely to trouble Kellogg's brand awareness campaigns. There could certainly have been better publicity. In looking at the qualifications and experience of the Fire Risk Assessors this is definitely an area with great variations. How can it be that the most important aspect of life safety control in respect of fire has no minimum requirement for the practitioner? Whilst it is almost certainly apocryphal the thoughts of the Fire Risk Assessment being undertaken by a Traffic Warden initially causes a 'titter' but that eventually causes alarm. The alarm is because there is nothing to prevent the Traffic Warden from doing a Fire Risk Assessment! Thankfully, some of the blue chip companies in the UK have recognised that you cannot get something for nothing and have perhaps been more demanding than most in respect of the Fire Risk Assessors experience, albeit it may have taken an initial poor quality Fire Risk Assessment to bring this awareness to their attention.
Unfortunately, feedback from the field identifies that some of the Government Bodies and Local Authorities are those mainly responsible for obtaining their Fire Risk Assessments on the cheap and their primary concern is cost and not the quality. However, having been critical of the quality of the Fire Risk Assessors used one is forced to question what guidance is available to a responsible person in respect of choosing a suitable Fire Risk Assessor? Sadly there is very little. If the responsible person looks for registers of 'Fire Risk Assessors' he will find a limited number, led by the IFE and supported by organisations such as the Association Building Engineers (ABE) and a few others. Unfortunately there is no core curriculum against which these organisations can accredit Fire Risk Assessors on a common basis. Most of the course curriculum has been generated based solely on the knowledge of the training personnel or approval body that sets out to approve the Fire Risk Assessors. In some cases these authorities are highly knowledgeable on the subject of detection and alarms and very weak in respect of the passive fire safety or are excellent on structure and clueless on travel distances/time. Before we have a major disaster in a fire risk assessed buildings, should we not be establishing a core curriculum for the various Approving Bodies to follow and a National Accreditation Scheme to check on the output of those bodies? Currently the organisations are competing and not co-operating. Hardly a recipe for robust life safety!
Within International Fire Consultants Ltd (IFC Group) we have over the past ten years or so attempted to produce a core curriculum for the basis of a Fire Risk Assessor training regime. The content is awesome, even to just cover the basic 'life safety' type of RRO generated Fire Risk Assessment. When you include an understanding of the basics of active systems and equipment, passive fire protection, their impact on means of escape, management and fire fighters needs the skill set required by a Fire Risk Assessor starts to rival that of a fire engineer. Where do such 'super-techies' come from? Certainly not from our specialised 'fire' universities where the course content is nowhere near broad enough. Reluctantly the view is forming that a Fire Risk Assessment is unlikely to be adequately carried out by a single person and we believe it is unethical to keep promoting this 'super' being. Hopefully people won't have to get injured before others come to a similar conclusion.
What about the quality of these Fire Risk Assessments? Even for similar types of buildings the outputs vary from a single page of ticked or crossed boxes to 50, or more pages of script. The identification of the measures needed to offset the risks that the assessment discovered from our analysis range from non-existent to way over the top. Perhaps the most appalling, but unsurprising examples are where the result of a 'cheap' Fire Risk Assessment is received together with a quote for several thousands of pounds worth of remedial work. No such thing as 'free lunch' or 'Fire Risk Assessment'!
After this initial period of operation I believe we need to hold an urgent review of the process. At the very least we must start to consider some form of truly independent accreditation against a transparent curriculum. The UK has a generally acceptable fire safety record in terms of death and injury outside of the home; let us keep it that way because the current lack of imposed professionalism could threaten the present situation.
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