A Change In Fire Door Regulations (Fire Safety Regulations 2022)

After years of lobbying, fire door regulations are finally changing.

Under the new legislation, responsible persons will be required to undertake more regular inspections of their fire doors in residential premises. This includes buildings such as purpose-built blocks of flats, individual homes, and even sheltered housing.

Since the devastating events of Grenfell, 2017, more and more voices within the fire safety industry have been calling for reform on outdated fire safety regulations which are putting people at risk.

This news is well-received by us and those that have been concerned about the lack of regulation around fire safety and inspection within multi-occupancy buildings.

But what do these new regulations mean for building owners, landlords and other responsible parties?

What Are The New Fire Door Regulations?

From January 2023, The Fire Safety Regulations 2022 are becoming a legal requirement for landlords and other responsible parties. The new legislation is being placed under article 24 of the Fire Safety Order 2005.

These regulations apply to any and all premises that house workplaces within them, as well as all the common parts of all multi-occupancy residential buildings over 11m in height.

As part of these new regulations, those responsible must carry out annual checks of flat entrance doors and quarterly checks of every fire door (including self-closing devices) in the common parts of the building.

The new regulations also cover a range of other health & safety legislation regarding educating their occupants on the importance of fire safety.

One such change requires that responsible persons provide residents of all multi-occupancy buildings with comprehensive information surrounding the importance of fire doors to the wider safety of the building.

Why Are Fire Door Regulations Changing Now?

These changes are considered by some, to be long overdue.

The root of these changes to fire door regulations stems from the tragedy of Grenfell in 2017. The Grenfell Tower Inquiry that followed made note in Phase 1 that “fire doors play an essential role in preventing or inhibiting the spread of smoke and toxic gases and in preserving the effective compartmentation of buildings.”

Unfortunately, due to a lack of inspection or regulations around the maintenance of fire doors, it was found that Grenfell Tower’s fire doors were not suitable to prevent smoke and gases from spreading. The main reason for this was damage and/or disrepair.

As a result, the inquiry made recommendations to every owner or manager of residential buildings to carry out an urgent inspection of all current fire doors, to ensure compliance with legislative standards.

Do These Changes Fix The Current Issues With Fire Door Regulations?

In truth – No.

These sweeping changes in fire door regulations are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to filling in gaps within fire door legislation.

“Best Endeavours”

Within the new fire door regulations, there is still some lack of clarity in legislation phrasing, which may make it easy for the minority to take advantage.

The current phrasing on the gov.uk website reads as “The regulations will require responsible persons to undertake best endeavour annual checks of flat entrance doors and quarterly checks of communal doors”.

This means that is at the responsible person’s discretion to determine how to best convince residents to give access to their doors for these regular checks. In reality, this wording provides people with a way of avoiding carrying out these inspections under the guise of having difficulty gaining approval for access.

Unqualified Manufacturers

Currently, legislation does not prohibit or prevent unqualified manufacturers from creating performance fire doorsets. In 2022, life-saving devices such as fire doors can be manufactured under a Global Assessment scheme, by manufacturers who are not properly qualified or tested. It goes without saying we are among those that think this is wrong as legislation should prohibit non-certified manufacturers.

You wouldn’t let unqualified manufacturers make seatbelts, so why let them make fire safety devices?

This is making the industry increasingly weary of specifying doors which are tested under these schemes, and causing an uptake in requests for Individual Burns Tests on every specified performance doorset.

However, the sheer number of possible doorset combinations (door leaves, cores, ironmongery etc.) makes it impossible to supply Primary Test Evidence for every door in every possible situation.

A Step In The Right Direction For Fire Door Legislation

There’s no denying that this is a great step toward more comprehensive fire door legislation. Under the new regulations, responsible parties of residential buildings have more responsibility than ever to ensure their fire safety protocols are compliant.

Whilst this will no doubt tighten up the historic lack of regulation within the fire safety industry, we think there are still some steps to be made before we reach a level of ‘best practice’.

At RW Joinery, we specialise in the manufacture, installation, and maintenance of fully certified performance doorsets.

If you’d like to discuss these legislative changes or your project in more detail, feel free to talk to an expert today. Simply fill out the form below or call us on 0161 480 8722.