NAPIT welcomes the publication of the Building Safety Bill
NAPIT welcomes the publication of the Building Safety Bill but calls for more to be done to ensure parity of safety for occupiers
The Building Safety Bill is a result of the Grenfell Tragedy in June 2017 and is set to implement the recommendations made by Dame Judith Hackitt, in her Independent Review of Building Regulations and Fire Safety, published in May 2018. It seeks to establish a new Building Safety Regulator within the Health and Safety Executive in England responsible for implementing and monitoring a more stringent regime for higher-risk buildings by improving building safety and performance standards in all buildings, give residents a stronger voice, drive culture change, enhance competence and incentivise compliance whilst also introducing a New Homes Ombudsman and make provisions to increase the regulation of construction products.
Commenting on the Bill, Mike Andrews, NAPIT’s Chief Executive said:‘It’s pleasing that the Building Safety Bill is focused on monitoring and enhancing the competence of those working in the built environment industry and provides powers to impose specific competence requirements to ensure work is undertaken in compliance with the Building Regulations. The creation of a new Committee on Industry Competence, outlined within the Bill, will be crucial in delivering a consistent approach to determining and evaluating competence. I’m delighted that David Cowburn, NAPIT’s Chief Operating Officer has been invited to join the Interim Industry Competence Committee which will start to focus on this task until the Building Safety Bill becomes an Act, following which the Committee on Industry Competence will be introduced.
It is interesting to note that Clause 84 imposes an ongoing duty on Accountable Persons to take all reasonable steps and actions necessary to manage building safety risks to prevent the spread of fire, structural failure, and any other prescribed matter. We urge the Government to make it clear whether this extends to managing and monitoring the safety of electrical installations in dwellings and communal areas within Higher Risk Buildings as recommended by the Housing, Communities and Local Communities Select Committee in their pre-legislative scrutiny of the draft Building Safety Bill.
Protection from electrical dangers should not be dependent on where you live. Policy alignment in this area is key to improving electrical safety in dwellings and we ask the Government to build on the recent Electrical Safety Standards in the Private Rented Sector (England) Regulations 2020 and require electrical safety checks to be carried out at least once every 5 years in all dwellings within HRBs.’
To read the Bill in full, click here: Building Safety Bill (parliament.uk)
To read the Building Safety Bill Explanatory Notes, click here: Building Safety (parliament.uk)
To read more about NAPIT’s campaign calling on the Government to End the Disparity of Electrical Safety Checks in Dwellings across the UK and between Tenures, Click here
Article Published:
06 July 2021
building regulationsgovernmentelectrical safety