Introduction to Fire Safety Management

1.3
The moral, legal and fi nancial 
reasons for promoting good 
standards of safety within an 
organisation
1.3.1 Moral (humane) reasons
There are a number of convincing arguments for the 
promotion of good safety standards. The human con-
sequences of fi res, accidents and incidents are wide-
spread and affect a number of different people in 
differ ent ways.
The most obvious result of a fi re or an accident 
at work is that the persons directly involved are likely 
to suffer. The impact on these individuals ranges from 
death through to relatively minor injuries. In addition to 
the physical impact on a person, it is often the case that 
individuals involved in any form of safety event suffer 
some form of physiological ill health.
Less obvious, but no less real, are the effects upon 
the families and dependants of those who suffer injury 
or ill health caused at work. The impact on these groups 
can be signifi cant and wide ranging, e.g.:
➤
The emotional stress of seeing a family member 
suffer
➤
Financial hardship due to loss of earnings
➤
The loss of social amenity
➤
The potential requirement for the provision of long-
term care.
In addition to those directly affected, work colleagues 
and other witnesses of any serious work-related injury are 
proven to be susceptible to a number of related physio -
logical disorders such as post-traumatic stress disorder 
(PTSD).
Figure 1.1
Aftermath of fi re – the cost of failing to manage 
fi re safety

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Fire safety foundations
3
There can also be signifi cant emotional and physio-
logical consequences for those who may consider 
themselves to some degree directly responsible for 
killing or injuring a work colleague, member of the public 
or a product/service user by either failing to manage 
safety effectively or through simply making a mistake.
Every working day in Great Britain, at least one 
person is killed and over 6000 are injured as a result of 
work activities and about one million people take time 
off because of what they regard as work-related illness. 
In total, accidents and work-related ill health result in 
about 30 million lost work-days.