Fire safety in residential buildings has traditionally focused heavily on the physical measures intended to prevent the spread of fire and provide safe routes out of a building. Increasingly, however, another question is receiving greater attention: what happens when an occupant cannot use those routes without assistance?
That question has become particularly relevant in 2026 following the introduction of new requirements for Residential Personal Emergency Evacuation Plans, commonly referred to as Residential PEEPs.
The Fire Safety (Residential Evacuation Plans) (England) Regulations 2025 came into force on 6 April this year. They introduce new responsibilities intended to improve fire safety for disabled and vulnerable residents whose ability to evacuate independently may be compromised.
For building owners and managers, the changes place greater emphasis on understanding individual residents’ needs. For the wider property and construction industry, they also reflect a broader shift towards treating accessible evacuation as an integral part of building safety.
What Has Changed in 2026?
The new regulations apply to residential buildings in England with two or more domestic premises that are at least 18 metres high or have at least seven storeys.
They also apply to residential buildings over 11 metres where a simultaneous evacuation strategy is in place.
Responsible Persons, typically the building owner or manager, must use reasonable endeavours to identify residents whose ability to evacuate without assistance could be compromised.
Where an identified resident chooses to participate, they must be offered a person-centred fire risk assessment. This considers their individual circumstances and the measures that could reasonably and proportionately reduce the risks they face.
An emergency evacuation statement is also produced, recording what that resident should do in the event of a fire.
The regulations also require building emergency evacuation plans, shifting the focus from individual arrangements to how evacuation would be managed across the building.
Evacuation Is Not the Same for Everybody
One key principle behind the changes is that the ability to leave a building cannot be assumed to be the same for every resident.
Someone who uses a wheelchair may be unable to use an escape staircase. A person with restricted mobility might be able to use stairs under normal circumstances but be unable to descend numerous floors during an emergency.
Other disabilities or impairments can also affect how somebody responds to an alarm, understands instructions or moves through a building.
This creates a practical challenge for fire and evacuation planning.
Providing a protected staircase is essential, but the presence of a staircase does not, by itself, explain how someone who cannot use it will reach a place of safety.
The government has described the Residential PEEPs measures as addressing the fire-safety concerns of the most vulnerable residents in high-rise and higher-risk residential buildings.
Why Building Design Still Matters
Residential PEEPs mainly create duties for the management of occupied buildings, but accessible evacuation also raises questions about building design.
If occupants may need assistance during an evacuation, the building has to provide an environment in which the agreed strategy can realistically operate.
That can involve protected escape routes, refuges or waiting areas, communication systems, appropriate signage and, where the fire strategy calls for it, lift-assisted evacuation.
An evacuation lift is specifically intended to support the evacuation of people who may be unable to use stairs. It is not simply a standard passenger lift that remains switched on during a fire.
Where one forms part of a building’s strategy, its protected environment, power arrangements, controls, communication systems and method of operation all need to be considered.
The recently published BS EN 81-76:2025 also reflects the increased technical attention on this area. The standard sets additional requirements for new passenger and goods-passenger lifts to support faster evacuation of persons with disabilities, including during a fire alarm.
Management and Building Design Have to Work Together
Accessible evacuation cannot be solved entirely through either building design or management procedures.
A technically suitable lift does not establish who will operate it during an emergency. Similarly, an evacuation plan cannot make unsuitable building infrastructure perform a function it was not designed for.
The two sides therefore need to work together.
The government’s guidance for Responsible Persons requires an ongoing process, rather than treating a Residential PEEP as a document produced once and forgotten. Assessments, mitigating measures and evacuation statements need to be reviewed, while information can also be provided to the local fire and rescue authority with the resident’s consent.
That matters because people’s circumstances can change, as can the way a building is occupied and managed.
The Changes Go Beyond Wheelchair Access
Accessible evacuation is sometimes discussed almost entirely in terms of wheelchair users, but the issue is broader.
The Grenfell Tower Inquiry recommendation addressed residents whose ability to self-evacuate may be compromised, giving reduced mobility and cognition as examples.
The government’s current guidance similarly refers to residents with disabilities or impairments rather than limiting the process to one particular form of disability.
That distinction is important.
A building may meet accessibility requirements for everyday use without necessarily answering every question about how different occupants would leave during an emergency.
Day-to-day access and emergency evacuation are related, but they are not the same design problem.
Fire and Rescue Services Are Part of the Picture
Another feature of the new regulations is providing information to local fire and rescue authorities.
With the resident’s consent, relevant information can be shared about where residents requiring assistance are located and the indicative level of assistance they may need. This is intended to help inform the operational response where the fire and rescue service needs to support evacuation.
This does not mean evacuation planning can rely on firefighters arriving and removing everyone who cannot use the stairs.
Instead, it gives emergency services better information about vulnerable occupants as part of the building’s wider arrangements.
A Wider Change in Building Safety
The Residential PEEPs regulations are one part of the continuing programme of reforms following the Grenfell Tower Inquiry.
The government’s May 2026 progress report confirmed that the regulations had come into force and that work continues on the remaining element of the policy requiring primary legislation.
At the same time, changes to building guidance, evacuation planning and lift standards are putting more attention on what happens to occupants who cannot simply walk down an escape staircase.
For architects and developers, that makes accessible evacuation an issue worth considering much earlier in the design process.
For owners and managers of occupied residential buildings, it means understanding the people who live there and ensuring that emergency plans reflect their actual needs.
For the industry as a whole, it represents a move toward a more complete definition of building safety: not only providing a route out of a building, but also considering whether the people inside can realistically use it when they need to.
