Articles
Fire Safety in Care Homes: Meeting Your Legal Duty of Care
The legal framework
Fire safety in care homes, as in most non-domestic premises in England and Wales, sits under the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005. The “responsible person” — usually the registered manager or provider — must carry out and regularly review a fire risk assessment, put in place appropriate fire precautions, and ensure staff are trained to respond appropriately. Care Quality Commission inspections also look closely at fire safety arrangements as part of their assessment of a service’s overall safety.
Why care homes need a different approach
Standard evacuation planning assumes people can move quickly and independently to a place of safety. In a care home, many residents cannot. This is why individual Personal Emergency Evacuation Plans (PEEPs) matter so much — a resident with dementia may need a calm, familiar staff member to guide them, while a resident with limited mobility may require specific equipment or two members of staff to assist. A generic evacuation plan that doesn’t account for these differences leaves both residents and staff exposed.
What good practice looks like
Individual PEEPs for every resident, reviewed whenever a resident’s needs change, not just annually.
Regular, realistic fire drills that account for night-time staffing levels, since overnight fires present the highest risk with the fewest staff on hand.
Clear allocation of fire warden responsibilities across every shift, including nights and weekends.
Up-to-date fire risk assessments that reflect the current building layout, resident needs, and any changes to staffing or occupancy.
Common gaps we see
The most frequent shortfalls are PEEPs that haven’t been updated since a resident’s condition changed, fire drills that only ever take place during well-staffed daytime shifts, and fire risk assessments that predate a refurbishment or change in resident numbers. Any of these can turn a routine inspection into a serious compliance finding.
Getting ahead of it
Fire safety in a care setting isn’t a one-off tick-box exercise — it needs to be treated as a living part of care planning, reviewed at the same cadence as care plans themselves. Providers who build fire safety review into their existing resident review cycle tend to stay compliant with far less last-minute scrambling before an inspection.
How PeopleFirstHR can help
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