Introduction to Fire Safety Management

1
Fire safety foundations
This chapter discusses the following key 
elements:
➤
The scope and nature of both fi re and occu-
pational health and safety
➤
The moral, legal and fi nancial reasons for 
promoting good standards of safety within 
an organisation
➤
The legal framework for the regulation of 
fi re and health and safety
➤
The legal and fi nancial consequences of 
failure to manage safety
➤
The nature and signifi cance of key sources 
of fi re and health and safety information
➤
The basis of a system for managing safety.

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Introduction to Fire Safety Management
2
Hazard
– a source or situation with the potential to 
cause harm (death, injury, ill health, damage to property 
or environment).
Risk
– the combination of the likelihood and severity 
(consequences) of a hazard causing harm.
Further defi 
nitions will be provided throughout 
the book.
1.2
Scope and nature
In today’s complex world effective safety management 
is the cornerstone of managing an economically viable 
business. The requirement to manage safety effectively 
extends to all private and public business sectors. Legal 
responsibilities for safety performance extend through-
out all organisations from the management board to the 
student on work experience.
Every operation within any organisation has an 
impact on the safety not only of those undertaking 
and managing the work but also of others who may be 
affected by their work activities. Any product or service 
provided to any body must be designed or delivered in 
such a way as to reduce the risks to the end users to an 
acceptable level. Therefore it can be seen that safety is 
inextricably linked with all facets of work.
The failure to manage safety adequately all too often 
results in death or injury, chronic ill health and damage 
to property and/or the environment. Such results have 
a signifi cant impact on the physical and economic well-
being of society.
In the Health and Safety Commission’s (HSC) 
revitalising health and safety strategy statement the cost 
of health and safety failures to society as a whole was 
estimated as being as high as £18 billion annually. In 
terms of the cost of fi re alone in the UK, the direct costs 
were estimated to be in the region of £8 billion for 2003, 
which is equivalent to about 1% of the gross domestic 
profi t (GDP) of the English and Welsh economy.
In Europe, the guiding philosophy of legislation 
since the early 1990s has been for those who work with 
hazards and risks in relation to fi re and health and safety 
to effectively control them. This requires organisations 
and individuals to assess the potential risks associ-
ated with their work activities and to introduce effective 
measures to control such risks.
High profi le prosecutions in the UK have reinforced 
the message that the responsibility for effective safety 
management rests not only with the body corporate but 
also with individuals within an organisation.