Building Safety Act: second legislation update
24 August 23
The Government’s Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC), has published the following five Regulations under the Building Safety Act 2022.
- The Building Regulations etc. (Amendment) (England) Regulations 2023
- The Building Regulations (Higher-Risk Building Procedures) (England) 2023
- The Building (Approved Inspectors etc. And Review of Decisions) (England) Regulations 2023
- The Higher-Risk Buildings (Management of Safety Risks etc) (England) Regulations 2023
- The Building Safety Act 2022 (Consequential Amendments etc.) Regulations 2023
The regulations deliver the recommendations from Dame Judith Hackitt’s report, Building A Safer Future, and cover the technical detail establishing a more precise process for the design and construction of higher-risk buildings, wider changes to the building regulations for all buildings and the details of the new in-occupation safety regime for higher-risk buildings.
Further draft regulations will be laid shortly on the keeping and provision of information connected to higher risk buildings, including information on the golden thread of information, and regulations on regulators charges and how the BSR will recover costs incurred.
Karl Whiteman, CLC Industry Sponsor for Building Safety said: “The CLC welcomes the publication of these regulations as they start to give industry much needed clarity on what is required. We must all understand, prepare and implement the steps needed to make change happen. We all have a part to play in delivery buildings that are safe.”
While the Regulations do provide clarity in a number of areas, there are still other elements which are not yet clear, and this includes some of the work of industry to better define competence requirements outside of the main duty holder roles, and how this information needs to be accessed and shared to show a competent workforce.
To assist government and industry raise the bar in terms of standards and competence, the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has set up an Industry Competence Committee (ICC), which will support the work of the Building Safety Regulator (BSR) by providing insights and guidance to facilitate an improvement of competence across industry. JIB Chief Executive Jay Parmar has been appointed as a member of the ICC and has over 25 years of experience on which to draw upon to assist the BSR with its consultations.
The JIB will continue to make meaningful strides to support the wider industry by raising the bar on standards and promoting the benefits of a qualified and competent workforce. This is one of the reasons the JIB developed ECS Check as a smart technology solution to monitor competency at each tier of the supply chain. To find out how to benefit from this free to access system, click here to watch a brief explanatory video.