The building owner is responsible for maintaining each fire safety measure to the required minimum standard of performance contained in the fire safety schedule. For fire safety measures that apply to buildings but are not specified in a fire safety schedule, the measures must be maintained to the standard to which each measure was originally designed and implemented.  An agent cannot be made responsible for this requirement.

Fire safety measures include items of equipment, forms of construction or fire safety strategies that are provided in a building to promote the safety of people using the building in the event of fire. It can include items such as portable fire extinguishers, fire hydrants, fire sprinklers, fire detection and alarm systems and lightweight construction. Fire safety measures include both ‘essential’ and ‘critical’ fire safety measures as defined in the Regulation’s dictionary.  Essential fire safety measures are often identified in the building’s fire safety schedule, where a schedule was required to be issued, or they could be included in the essential services list attached to an approval or order issued under the Local Government Act 1919 or the Local Government Act 1993. Essential fire safety measures are the fire safety measures that form part of an annual fire safety statement. Critical fire safety measures require periodic assessment and inspection at intervals of less than 12 months. These measures are specifically identified on the fire safety schedule and form part of a supplementary fire safety statement. A critical fire safety measure is also an essential fire safety measure. 

A fire safety schedule specifies each of the fire safety measures that apply to the building. The measures specified in the fire safety schedule will vary for each building and can include both essential and critical fire safety measures. The schedule also specifies the minimum standard of performance for each of the measures. This reflects the standard to which each measure must be designed, installed and capable of operating.  

An annual fire safety statement is a declaration by or on behalf of a building owner that an accredited fire safety practitioner has:  • assessed, inspected and verified the performance of each essential fire safety measure that applies to the building  • inspected the exit systems serving the building and found they do not contravene the provisions of part 15 of the Regulation.  A building owner must ensure that an annual fire safety statement for the building is issued each year and that a copy of the statement is provided to the local council and Commissioner of Fire and Rescue NSW.

A supplementary fire safety statement is a declaration by or on behalf of a building owner that an accredited fire safety practitioner has assessed, inspected and verified the performance of each critical fire measure that applies to the building.  The intervals for when supplementary fire safety statements must be issued for each critical fire safety measure is listed in the fire safety schedule. 

The requirements apply to the owners of buildings that contain critical fire safety measures as listed in the fire safety schedule for the building. 

The Regulation requires that the fire safety statement be issued by or on behalf of the owner. The owner must sign the declaration in section 8 of the form for annual fire safety statements and section 9 for supplementary fire safety statements.  A building owner could be an individual, a company or an owners’ corporation. Where a person acting as an agent issues the statement on behalf of the owners, they need to have appropriate prior authority from the owners to do so. An agent may include a strata manager, executive committee of an owners’ corporation, an authorised employee of the company that owns the property, the executor of a deceased estate or another person appointed to manage the affairs of the building owner.  In the case of a building with multiple owners, one owner may issue the statement. However, each of the other owners must authorise the owner who issues the statement to act as their agent.  An accredited fire safety practitioner must not make the declaration where they have assessed a fire safety measure or inspected the building’s exit system (for an annual fire safety statement). This includes any employer/employee or direct associate of the accredited practitioner who undertook the assessment or inspection. This is consistent with the fire safety statement process in the Regulation, which recognises the different and separate roles and responsibilities for building owners and accredited fire safety practitioners. It also ensures building owners (who are ultimately responsible) remain directly engaged in the fire safety statement process. 

An accredited fire safety practitioner is a person who is accredited under a government-approved industry accreditation scheme as an ‘accredited practitioner (fire safety)’.  A building owner must select an accredited fire safety practitioner from a government register. The practitioner must hold relevant accreditation from a government-approved scheme to assess the specific fire safety measure or inspect the fire exit systems serving the building.  Where the Commissioner for Fair Trading is satisfied there is no person accredited to assess a specific fire safety measure, the commissioner may authorise the building owner to determine and document that the person selected to assess the measure is competent. credited fire safety practitioner?