An employer will have to consider a worker's capabilities as regards fire safety if they ask them to do something

Here we explain the above mentioned regulation that is relevant to all employers in England and Wales, and took effect on 6 April 2010. 

overview

• The implementation of the Fire Safety (Employees' Capabilities) (England) Regulations 2010 was purely a technical wording exercise to make sure some wording was added back in to the Fire Safety Order that got omitted first time round in 2006. 
• It has not imposed any additional requirements on businesses
• The additional bit of regulation is a couple of lines long, and states employers have to think about what a worker is able and unable to do when giving them tasks and how these capabilities may affect their ability to deal with fire-related risks 
  

The exact wording

From 6 April 2010, new regulations will clarify an employer’s responsibilities to consider the capabilities of their workers to carry out any fire safety-related tasks or assignments.  The regulation is just a single line saying:

Employer to take employees’ capabilities into consideration
2.  Every employer must, in entrusting tasks to employees, take into account their capabilities as regards health and safety, so far as those capabilities relate to fire.

Therefore, employers will have to think about:

• What a worker is able and unable to do when giving them tasks 
• How these capabilities may affect their ability to deal with fire-related risks

For example, an employer will have to consider a worker's capabilities as regards fire safety if they ask them to work with petrol.  

http://www.opsi.gov.uk/si/si2010/uksi_20100471_en_1 for more info.

What was this gap in the Fire Safety Order?

The Fire Safety Order is still the main piece of fire legislation in the UK.   The making of these regulations is a technical exercise to ensure some missing wording has been included back in to the FSO that got missed out first time round when they published it in 2006.  The minor technicality they had to address was a little gap in the wording in the FSO.  The gap occurred because in order to stop the FSO requirements overlapping with Health and Safety of Workers 89 (HSWA) regulations, article 47 of the FSO disapplied the obligations in the HSWA and any regulations made under it to which the FSO applies.  This included the obligations in relation to workers’ capabilities in the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999, relating to fire safety.  Therefore government needed to explicitly re-apply the regulation in respect of employers taking in to account the capabilities of their staff as regards fire safety tasks.

How will it impact my business?

These regulations should not impose any extra burden on a business. They simply re-impose a duty that:

• You had before when the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 came into force in October 2006 
• Is implicit in wider health and safety duties