It is the common aspiration of people to live and work in peace and contentment. However, in real life, the buildings where people live, as well as the sites where they work or do activities, are often due to the use of inappropriate building materials, or the improper use of electricity or fuel, and the existence of human negligence in the use and maintenance of facilities and equipment in buildings or sites, and the probability of fire and the difficulty of prevention and control are correspondingly increased. This will undoubtedly bring greater risks to people's lives and property safety. In a small, built-up and densely populated environment like Macau, once a fire breaks out, if the facilities and equipment of the building or place cannot effectively resist the spread of the fire, the consequences will be unimaginable. Therefore, to effectively prevent fire, it depends on the establishment of a sound fire safety legal system.

    The current legal system of building fire safety in Macao was regulated by Decree No. 24/95/M of June 9, 1995 and the Fire Safety Regulations approved by it. It has been in use for more than 25 years, and has failed to cover the new breakthroughs in building technology, materials, fire protection systems, facilities and equipment, etc., which has been difficult to keep pace with the rapid social and economic development of Macao. In addition, the provisions of the existing system on fire safety law enforcement authority and related penalties also need to be improved, and there is still room for improvement in the efficiency and effectiveness of law enforcement, which fails to effectively guide and promote the formation of a fire prevention culture of self-protection and action among the people. There is therefore an urgent need for the Authorities to make appropriate amendments to the existing building fire safety legal regime to better respond to various demands brought about by social development.

    Since 2005, the Land, Works and Transport Bureau has continued to follow up on the establishment and improvement of the fire safety legal regime by holding briefings and soliciting views from representatives of various associations, trades and government departments, and issuing letters to relevant professional bodies. The Fire Services Department also actively participated in the process, during which it held more than 90 meetings with the Land, Works and Transport Bureau to express its views and put forward written views on legislative issues on many occasions.

    By January 2020, the Chief Executive has directed the security sector to co-ordinate the legislative work. Subsequently, the Office of the Secretary for Security, in collaboration with the Fire Services Bureau and the Legal Bureau, has held many discussions, listened to the views of the Land, Works and Transport Bureau and trade bodies, and made reference to the relevant legal systems of the Mainland of China and other countries or regions, and drafted a bill on the Legal Regime for Fire Safety in Buildings and Venues. After much discussion by the Executive Council, the bill was finalized and submitted to the Legislative Council for deliberation on 6 November. On 19 November 2020, the Legal Regime for Fire Safety of Buildings and Venues Bill was passed by the Legislative Council in general.

    Under the "Legal Regime for Fire Safety in Buildings and Venues" Bill, the Government proposes to add the following eight new elements:

    (a) to extend the scope of application of the law to regulate fire safety at specific sites in addition to general buildings;

    (b) In view of the absence of the existing role of the Fire Services Department in supervision and enforcement, the law enforcement functions are re-defined and the fire Services Department is vested with supervision and punishment powers in respect of fire safety;

    (3) The introduction of "self-protection obligations", it is clear that the owner of the building and the site and other owners or holders, have the obligation to ensure the fire safety conditions of the building or site and bear the corresponding responsibility;

    (d) to fill the loopholes in the fire safety technical specifications, and add special requirements for "performance-based design", so that public authorities can refer to relevant domestic and international recommendations and standard rules when approving applications or plans in future, and allow the use of performance-based design based on the particularities of buildings or sites;

    (e) the approval procedure for professional schemes, which allows the FSD to make use of professional advice from qualified third party entities in vetting professional fire safety schemes;

    (f) to formulate a fire safety qualification system to specifically regulate the registration and responsibility system of technical personnel and qualified enterprises to perform the duties of inspection, maintenance and repair of fire safety systems, and to be supervised by the fire Services Department;

    7) To strengthen preventive and legal supervision measures, that is, the Secretary of the Land, Works and Transport Bureau and the Director of the Fire Station can take corresponding preventive and supervisory measures, such as prohibiting illegal works, seizing illegal storage items, etc.;

    (8) To improve the punishment system, on the one hand, to add criminal liability and create offences against orders, on the other hand, to divide administrative offences into three levels of very serious, serious and minor, offenders may be fined between $2,000 and $200,000 patacas, and if they are legal persons, the fine may be increased to $800,000 patacas.

    Next, the security sector will actively cooperate with the detailed deliberations of the Legislative Council, strive for the early introduction of a new legal system for fire safety, and provide a solid and effective legal guarantee for the construction of Macao into a safe city suitable for living and working.

    However, fire safety is not only the responsibility of the authorities, in fact, it is also closely related to every resident in Macao and all sectors of the community. To this end, the SAR Government, the trade and the residents must work together to raise awareness, assume their due responsibilities in different aspects of fire safety, and play their own roles in order to build a better fire safety environment in the community.

----- from "Building a New System for Fire Safety" of Public Security Police Station

Last revision date: January 28, 2021