I live in a block of flats built in 1984, the front was retained from an 1890 commercial building but the rest of the flats were purpose built with solid concrete floors, smoke vents at the top of the communal stairs and fire doors off the stairs. The flats are over 4 floors including the basment flats. A fire assessment has been carried out each year professionally and commissioned by the management company which consists of 5 of the residents, no fire safety issues have been raised in these assessments. More recently the local city council environment health have visited and said that because the building does not adhere to 1991 building regulations it must have smoke alarms in the communal stairways linked to heat detectors in the hallway of each flat.
I can't find any reference as to why this is needed, the ARMA guidance "Fire Safety in Flats" says that purpose built flats designed for compartmentation don't require alarms. The government's "Fire Safety in Purpose Built Blocks of Flats Guide" states that "Communal fire alarm systems should not be installed unless it can be demonstrated that there is no other practicable way of ensuring an adequate level of safety. If such a system is provided, it must be possible to manage it." and that "more generally, application of current benchmark standards to an existing block of flats is not normally appropriate."
Am I missing something here, the 1991 reference seems to apply to converted flats where they will not have the same levels of compartmentation.
Thanks for any insight.
Chris
