The New Zealand Fire Service has a say in new building designs.

The new Building Act (2004) means the Fire Service is now involved in the review of fire safety designs lodged for building consent, providing information on firefighting facilities and means of escape requirements, says fire risk management national director Dr Paula Beever.

'This will mean that any concerns we may raise about a building can be raised before it becomes difficult, or expensive, to rectify building design faults. A main cause of these problems has been the poor documentation lodged for building consent.'

The reviews conducted by the Fire Service will be on buildings Gazetted by the chief executive of the Department of Building & Housing. The Fire Service will review building projects that require evacuation schemes and rely on performance-based fire engineering designs.

Dr Beever says the Fire Service has set up a national design review unit, comprising qualified fire engineers, to carry out the role.

'The unit will provide advice to the Building Consent Authority. The authority must take regard of this advice when considering issuing a building consent.'

The Fire Service has not been involved in the building consent process to replace the fire engineering peer reviewer, so the role of the unit will not be to check all aspects of a fire engineering design. However, the design parameters for a significant range of fire safety systems will be reviewed.

Dr Beever says the unit is acting in a regulatory role so can't provide advice to designers. 'A code of practice is being developed to help designers produce designs that incorporate facilities for firefighting.'