The Regulations (Wiring Regulations, as laid down by the IET, IEE as was) are not Statutory, essentially they are a set of recommendations, a code of practice if you like, enhanced by becoming a British Standard a few years back. But that`s all they are, they were (fairly recently) referred to in limited terms in landlord legislation.
The wise folk treat them as if they were statutory and attempt to obey them in full, nothing wrong with that.
Often the laws themselves actually say very little and the guidance's give quite good suggestions on how to apply them.
I suspect that the relationship between the Highway Code and Road Traffics Acts might have some similar relationships, those adept in legal matters could provide us with info to confirm or deny this, not me.
Anyway, we have a set of "Regulations" that we attempt to follow, all well and good, nothing wrong with that.
Over time our perception of what is "safe" and to what extent it is "safe or unsafe" changes in accordance with our practices and to what we expect.
Almost nothing in life is totally safe or intrinsically safe but we have a tendency to work with relative safety ideas in most things.
Things we used to consider to be safe enough at time they were in common usage we might not view them as quite so safe these days.
In my early working life I was quite happy to install consumer units with rewireable fuses an no RCDs, they were quite normal and they complied with regs at the time, they were quite common practice, almost exclusively done like that.
Over time MCBs became more common practice and then the later addition of RCDs in TN systems became quite widespread too.
When I look back at the older commonplace systems of rewireable fuses an no RCDs I do not feel as safe with them as I once did, they have not really become less safe in essence but my perception of relative safety has indeed changed.
Besides our perceptions changing I think our practices changed too, folk used to treat Electric with some respect in days gone by, it could bite you, it could bite you hard and be fatal, we put more safety into systems, folk rely on that safety more and often take more risks than they used to.
Perhaps not only the perceptions has changed but the reality has changed too?
Things we were relatively happy about years ago do not change in absolute safety terms from the days they were installed (apart from deterioration or damage - accidental or not) but our safety perception does and we might shudder when we look at those older systems. We might even wonder why there were not piles of dead bodies at every street corner back in those days.
Accordingly, we compare any installation, in terms of relative safety, as to the customs and practices - the regulations that apply today, no matter when they were built, that is how we compare them, two exactly the same installations have exactly the same risks or not and that applies no matter when they were built and how safe they were considered at the time.
In conclusion, the fact that they complied when built does not make them compare as relatively safe today and the further we go back then the less safe we might view such practices. We look at them today and make an opinion today, irrespective.
Note - I was not inferring that rewireable fuses are always less safe and MCBs are always safer either.
