The Government are today laying regulations to address the last three outstanding Grenfell Tower inquiry phase 1 recommendations, on personal emergency evacuation plans, or PEEPs, and building-level evacuation plans.
The Fire Safety (Residential Evacuation Plans) (England) Regulations 2025 mandate residential PEEPs and mark a long-awaited step forward in improving the fire safety and evacuation of vulnerable residents who were so badly let down on the night of the tragedy. It applies to residents living in England in high-rise residential buildings—at least seven storeys or 18 metres high—and 11-metre to 18-metre high buildings with a simultaneous evacuation strategy.
Through these regulations, residents with physical and mental disabilities and impairments will be entitled to:
a person-centred fire risk assessment to consider their specific individual risks and ability to evacuate in the event of a fire;
the measures that could be reasonably and proportionately introduced to mitigate against their risks and aid their evacuation;
a written statement recording what they should do in a fire and;
provision of information to their local fire and rescue service (where the resident consents to the information being shared) so they know where the most vulnerable residents live and can support their evacuation or rescue in the event of a fire.
The regulations also mandate production of whole-building evacuation plans, shared with local fire and rescue services.
The laying of the regulations addresses recommendations 33.22c, 33.22e, 33.22f—now numbers 59, 60 and 61—from phase 1 of the Grenfell Tower inquiry.
The Government have committed funding this year to begin this important work by supporting social housing providers to deliver residential PEEPs for their renters. Future years’ funding will be confirmed through the spending review and business planning processes.
In addition, Government are today publishing a factsheet and toolkit to support building owners and managers as they develop residential PEEPs. This toolkit contains real-life and proven initiatives to support vulnerable residents which have already been successfully deployed at scale.
The regulations will come into force on 6 April 2026.
The Government are committed to continued and full engagement with stakeholders as the policy is operationalised to ensure that it addresses the needs of users and reflects their lived experience. Specifically, we will:
continue to engage key stakeholders on draft statutory guidance to support building owners and managers in fulfilling the requirements of the regulations. The guidance will be published in the autumn.
set up a stakeholder advisory panel with representatives of disability stakeholders and building owners and managers, to identify and review new initiatives for inclusion in the toolkit.
continue to listen to stakeholders as residential PEEPs beds in, as part of monitoring the impact and effectiveness of the policy.
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