The Welsh Government has adopted many of the proposals from the Building Safety Act 2022 into their own building reforms and will introduce new fire safety duties for Responsible Persons that will commence on 1 October 2023, which is the same time it is enacted in England.

The Act came into force in June 2022, establishing a range of new requirements on construction companies, freeholders and managing agents to ensure the safety of residents in high-rise buildings. When Section 156 of the Act, that covers changes to the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005, is enacted, all appointed Responsible Persons in Wales will have the following new duties, including making a record of their fire risk assessment and reviews.

Other rules include; where a responsible person ceases to be a responsible person for a premises and another person takes over as a responsible person for the premises, the outgoing person must give the new responsible person any relevant fire safety information they hold about the building.

Where a building has two or more sets of domestic premises the responsible person must give residents information about “relevant fire safety matters”, which include identified risks, preventive and protective measures and the name and a UK based address for the responsible person.