IHEEM AE EVENT
introduced with registers of persons assessed by organisations accredited by others validated by being part of a Professional Engineering Institution (PEI) licensed by the Engineering Council’. So,” he said, “this is what Setting the bar and the HTM have said, but are our people out there undertaking fire risk assessments actually meeting either of these criteria?” Maz Daoud said that the recommendation was ‘A statutory requirement to use only fire risk assessors meeting the standards defined in WG4 criteria to conduct assessments of higher-risk buildings and those of complex fire risk’. He said: “That’s only a recommendation at the moment; it’s not a statutory requirement yet, but is likely to become one soon.”
“So,” he continued, “looking back at the IHEEM Technical Platform Terms of Reference, IHEEM is in the process of working with NAHFO – the National Association of Healthcare Fire Officers – to develop a process where people can be registered as competent fire risk assessors.” This, he said, would be based upon the joint expertise of the two organisations. He elaborated: “So, NAHFO has a wealth of knowledge and experience in fire safety and healthcare, and IHEEM has expertise in Authorising Engineer appointments, and has Engineering Council backing and available resources. It thus makes complete sense that these two groups should work together to produce some sort of register, and that’s exactly what we are in the process of doing. This accords with the original idea of IHEEM working with other groups, nationally and internationally.”
Helping Authorising Engineers Answering his own question: ‘How is this going to help the Authorising Engineer?’, Mazin Daoud put another one: ‘So, what is the role of the Authorising Engineer?’ He said: “Well, it’s defined in the HTM: ‘The Authorising Engineer (Fire) will act as an independent professional advisor to the healthcare organisation.’ But what is the first thing this individual has to do?; it is to act as assessor for the appointment of the Authorised Person (Fire).” The Authorised Person (Fire) (also known as the Fire Safety Advisor) meanwhile, states the HTM, ‘will be accountable to the Fire Safety Manager for matters of fire safety’. The guidance continues: ‘They provide competent fire safety advice, and will be responsible for undertaking recording and reporting fire risk assessments.’ Mazin Daoud said: “So the AE (Fire) has to appoint this person, and the first thing on the list for the AP is to complete fire risk assessments.” Expanding on this, he asked: “So – bearing in mind that this individual might not be on a specific premises for a particularly long time – how does the AE know who to appoint? Do they just go to
42 Health Estate Journal August 2021
well, and PAS 79 – the British Standards Institute publicly available specification on completing fire risk assessments – incorporates its own list of competencies that people completing this work should have. We thus have three lots of competencies from three different groups, and we are going through all three, picking out all of the relevant parts, and making sure we cover everything. There is an HTM 05-03 Part K on completing fire risk assessments, but there is very little on competency in it currently, and that will need revision as well at some point.”
Peer review process The Setting the Bar report.
one of the accredited registers at the moment and say, ‘Yes, you can have one of those people’? Or is it some magical process where they talk to a group of people and decide?”
Establishing a registration process He continued: “So, because there isn’t a particular system, we’re in the process of setting up a registration process for fire risk assessors, based on three things: the Fire Risk Assessment Competency Council recommendations, Setting the bar, and PAS 79. About 10 years ago, the Fire Risk Assessment Competency Council was set up to look at the competencies that anyone completing risk assessments should have. The Setting the bar report brought in another list of requirements as
Looking at how the work he had alluded to would be undertaken, Mazin Daoud said: “In the IHEEM AE accreditation they are selected via a peer review process, so we are going to go for that as the most obvious, and perhaps the best way, of doing this. However, our approach will be more formalised, in that we will have specific questions that are asked, and specific answers that we want to get back. It’s only going to be for higher-risk healthcare premises where there are at least dependent or very highly dependent patients. Where there are independent people, then we don’t think that you need to have this level of knowledge or expertise, and we will consider the specific premises hazards, such as oxygen, medical gas pipeline systems and cylinders, compartmentation and ventilation, with the emphasis and focus on management and training as the most critical aspects of fire safety within perhaps any environment, but certainly within hospitals.” Mazin Daoud said there had been ‘instances (that he knew of) of a really fairly new hospital, really well provided for in terms of fire safety, where things would have gone seriously wrong because the staff haven’t acted in the appropriate way’, and ‘other circumstances where perhaps we’ve had to deviate from the very high standards that are laid down in the HTM for very good reasons’. He said: “But the standard of competence of staff is such that the risk to patients is actually perhaps even reduced, due to their high levels of training and knowledge.”
The Department of Health’s Health Technical Memorandum, HTM 05-03 Part K, focuses on completing fire risk assessments in ‘complex healthcare premises’.
He concluded: “So that’s it in a nutshell. IHEEM is helping AEs by setting up a register of competent persons that are competent to do fire risk assessments, so when the AE (Fire) says: ‘I’m going to select someone to fulfil this role’, they simply have to say: ‘We want that person to be on the IHEEM register.’ Now, we’re still in the process of setting it up, but we’re hoping to run the trial this month, and it should be up and running very soon, and we’re anticipating quite a good take- up on this.” This was the end of both Mazin Daoud’s presentation, and of the speaker part of the session, which was followed by a lively ‘Q&A’ session.
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Courtesy of The Competence Steering Group for Building a Safer Future
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