The word of 'Regulation', what it means?

[Benzerari]

Guys;

The word of ‘regulation’ in fire safety, does it go under 'Legislation' meaning, OR 'Standard' and 'recommendation' meaning?

I am confused in here, as usual! 

[Benzerari]

Well here is the question in very simple way:

Is:  Regulation = law    OR    Regulation = standard

As they are too separate issues, and breaking the law is not like breaking the standard isn't?

I need a clear answer!

[Clevelandfire 3]

A Regulation is law. So for instance a regulation might state that you must provide the means of giving warning in case of fire in all commerical premises. There may be various ways of achieving compliance with a regulation by using a known accepted "standard" - i.e. Intall a fire alarm to BS 5839 pt or alternatively through risk assessment you might come up with an alternative which is just as good and achieves the same thing.

A standard is just "best practice" and is not a lawful requirement, however most enforcing authorities, and judges see standards as "benchmarks" - in oither words tried and tested methods to achieve something, so if you go against best practice you need to justify why you did so. 




 

[afterburner]

Benz,

there is a sort of pecking order which goes like this: -

 First there is legislation (e.g. the Fire (Scotland) Act 2005)
 Second there are Regulations made under an Act (e.g. the Fire Safety (Scotland) Regulations 2006)
       Both of these are 'legislation' and have a compliance duty

Next is an 'Approved Code of Practice' (ACoP) which creates legally binding standards to be achieved (which can be achieved in other ways but must be equivalent) whilst not quite legislation, an ACoP has a lot of legal imperative behind it.
       Next is a Code of Practice, not legally enforcible, but does become the 'benchmark' for evidence in any legal procedings.
       Now comes British Standards which set out technical standards which can be measured and can be used with confidence in any fire safety solution.

 Developing Cleveland's example, if your FRA (carried out to comply with legislation) identifies you need a fire alarm you need to check impacting 'Regulations' which may impact on the fire alarm.  Areas such as where Explosive Atmospheres may be experienced, or where people with hearing difficulties may nonetheless need to be warned about a fire are two examples of impacting Regulations. In these examples there are Approved Codes of Practice concerning electrical apparatus in explosive atmosphere areas and umpteen regulations to ensure the hearing impaired are provided for adequately. You must prove equal compliance with the ACoP, and to meet any challenge regarding disablities you would follow Codes of Practice concerning Disabled Persons and use equipment which has been tested and declared suitable for the application through British Standards

[Mike Buckley]

The other difference is the Parlimentary process. An Act has to go through a prescribed process of readings and debates in both houses, committee stages and finally Royal Assent. The whole thing can take months or even years. In the same way it can take ages for an Act to get changed or repealed. Most Acts are also what is known as enabling legislation i.e. they allow the appropirate Secretary of State to produce subordinate legislation in the form of Statutory Instruments these are usually the Regulations.

The process for producing Statutory Instruments is a lot less exacting than that for an Act therefore they can be produced more rapidly and modified as necessary. For example the rate of car tax is set by a Statutory Instrument and every year a new SI is produced replacing the previous year's with the new rate.

Then as above you get the ACOPS and other guidance, standards etc.

The other interesting thing is that if you breach any legislation brought in by Parliment it is automatically a criminal offence dealt with by the criminal courts.

The rest of it sueing people, breach of contract etc. is dealt with by civil courts.

[CivvyFSO]

And don't forget the statutory codes of practice, such as The Regulators compliance code.

The concordat is dead, long live the Regulators Compliance Code....

[Benzerari]

Thanks Guys for these refinements, apparently in other countries where fire safety might be primitive…, they consider quite different terminologies, fire legislation is promulgated first through a presidential decree or ordinance, then couple of regulations comes below it to specify some details related to a specific subjects and that's it, it ends in here, no further CoP or standards or codes..., even if you ask about any available codes, they keep referring to the regulations..., that's where I had the confusion.