The Fire Industry: useful documents and references

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The Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 – the Fire Safety Order – provides a framework for regulating fire safety in all non-domestic premises including workplaces and the parts of multi-occupied residential buildings used in common in England and Wales.

Approved Documents provide guidance on how to meet the building regulations. Part B contains guidance on fire safety, including means of escape, fire spread, structural fire protection and fire service access.

The British Standards provide recommendations and guidance on the provision of measures to control or mitigate the effects of fire, including business continuity and the environment. The primary objective of the standard is to ensure that a reasonable standard of life safety can be achieved in the event of fire in the building.

BS 476: Part 20: 1987 (BS EN 1363: Part 1: 2012) - Methods for determination of the fire resistance of construction elements (general principles) This part describes the general procedures and equipment required to determine the fire resistance of construction elements.

Replacing the MHCLG guidance documents and consolidated document. This now forms the basis of the external wall assessment.

In the EU, the fire testing and classification standards for construction products have been harmonised in European Standard EN 13501-1. The European Reaction to Fire classification system (Euro classes) is the EU common standard for assessing the qualities of building materials in the event of a fire.