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BSR and MHCLG discuss new unit to enforce cladding remediation
The Building Safety Regulator (BSR) and the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) are planning a dedicated unit to enforce cladding remediation.
Alex Norris, minister for local growth and building safety, revealed the plans in his written response to a question by Liberal Democrat MP Will Forster in February.
Mr Forster has asked MHCLG what steps are being taken “to ensure the effectiveness of (a) compliance by contractors with, and (b) enforcement measures by the new Building Safety Regulator with the Building Safety Act 2022”.
Mr Norris said: “BSR officials are working with MHCLG officials on setting up a dedicated Remediation Enforcement Unit within the BSR.
“The Remediation Enforcement Unit is designed to hold owners of ACM-clad buildings to account, enforcing remediation where necessary, and will be essential to meet the government’s priority for remediation of unsafe higher-risk buildings.”
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Mr Forster’s concern follows previous reports that the BSR has signed off just 14% of developers’ remediation plans in 2023-24.
There have also been calls from within the sector for the government to increase capacity at the BSR to address the significant delays to gateway application approvals.
Mr Norris said: “The BSR takes action to ensure that applications that do not meet the regulatory standards of building safety are rejected. We understand that the introduction of the new regulatory regime initially resulted in a lot of poor-quality and incomplete applications from industry.
“BSR continue to support applicants to meet the functional requirements of the building regulations. It is worth noting that the requirements in the regulations are not new and rejected applications contribute to the processing time of compliant applications.”
This concern about quality highlighted by the Labour MP was raised with City Hall members last month after a senior BSR executive pointed out that 40% of general applications are not able to assure that regulations are being met.
The BSR had previously admitted that assumptions and modelling related to the new building safety regime have “not survived first contact with reality”.
This has meant that the roll-out of the regime has been beset by delays due to higher-than-anticipated demand and problematic or incomplete applications.
Mr Norris also revealed that the government is considering further options to ensure compliance with the building safety regulations as part of the ongoing Spending Review.
He added: “The Building Safety Act 2022 also requires that within five years of the act coming into force, the secretary of state appoint an independent person to carry out a review. This includes reviewing the effectiveness of the regulator, and provisions made by or under the Building Act 1984 such as the dutyholder duties and enforcement measures.”
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