• Fire Science and Engineering
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.13-19
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• 2001

The OECD defines regulatory reform as both better regulation and deregulation, and emphasizes that governments must continue to regulate in areas such as environmental quality and safety. In contrast, Korean regulatory reform in fire services in the 1990s shows quite a strange trend, having been carried out only to the direction of softening and abolishing regulations. In the UK, fire prevention legislation has been strengthened since the enactment of the Fire Precautions Act 1971, and the Building Regulations 1991, which apply to all new buildings including a private house, require that there should be at least one smoke alarm on each floor. This research shows that the tightening of fire prevention legislation in the UK has promoted fire safety, which is very instructive for Korean fire services. In order for Korean fire services to protect citizens'lives and property from fires, one of basic directions of regulatory reform, to improve the quality of regulations relating to safety, health and the environment, should be observed strictly. Moreover, the flexibility of the basic direction of regulatory reform should be ensured so that the regulations concerning safety could be even increased under the overall reform strategy of reducing all regulations.