‘Yeah, near enough’

Those beleaguered public servants responsible for ensuring that buildings comply with Building Regulations could be forgiven for feeling a little more paranoid than usual. In March the communities department published a review called The Future of Building Control. This said the current system had “some serious failings and weaknesses that must be tackled”. Then, two weeks ago, the Tories published a policy document called Blueprint for a Green Economy that said “building control is simply unfit for purpose” and should be ditched.

Why has building control become the favourite whipping boy of government and opposition? The answer is because it is perceived to be failing to enforce compliance with Part L of the Building Regulations. This deals with a structure’s energy efficiency, and is therefore at the heart the struggle against climate change, which all the main political parties have put at the top of their agendas.

But Part L is the odd one out in world of regulations, as nearly all the others focus on health and safety issues. As a result, overstretched building control departments tend to focus on health and safety rather than energy conservation – to the dismay of the government and the industry at large. John Miller, the president of the Heating and Ventilating Contractors Association, used the HVCA’s recent annual lunch to accuse building control of failing to police the 2006 revisions to Part L. His exact words were that they were “quite deliberately turning a blind eye to the new regime”.

The Tories’ threats could be dismissed for now, as it does not look likely that they will be in power in the near future, but one thing is certain: the communities department is determined to tackle building control departments head on. It warns that the changes it has in mind have “far reaching implications” and suggests a range of possible reforms, including making much greater use of self-certification, and by implication, much less use of building control officers.

Those responsible for policing the regulations accept that the system is not perfect. “We do recognise there are shortcomings,” says Paul Everall, chief executive of Local Authority Building Control (LABC). “The demands on building control have increased significantly in recent years and, at the same time, there is pressure on local authorities to keep down numbers of staff employed.”

But local authorities are not going to give up without a fight. The LABC has buried its antipathy towards the private sector’s approved inspectors and has teamed up with their Association of Consultant Approved Inspectors, the RICS and the Association of Building Engineers to create the Building Control Alliance (BCA).

“The extension of self-certification to whole projects has given us the greatest cause for concern,” says Everall. The communities department suggests an “appointed person”, who works for a contractor, would take responsibility for ensuring compliance with the regulations, and would sign the job off.

Given that self-certification already exists, why shouldn’t it work for whole projects? For example Part P, the regulation for electrical safety, is entirely self-certified by electrical contractors who are deemed to be “competent persons” and therefore qualified to sign off electrical work. “We aren’t against competent persons,” says Steve Evans, the chief building control surveyor at Milton Keynes council and LABC’s representative on the BCA. “It’s suitable for small areas of specialised work and we couldn’t have picked up Part P overnight as it takes five years to train as an electrician. It has been proved to work.”

Evans says self-certification works when there is a single professional body responsible for compliance. “Where there’s a dilution, that’s where we’ve found difficulties,” he says. This concern is echoed by Peter Caplehorn, technical director of architect Scott Brownrigg. He says: “The problem with the more general stuff is that there is a much wider range of situations and no trade body with tight control,” he says. “It would become vague and degenerate to the lowest common denominator immediately.”

If we don’t have independent third-party adjudication we’d end up with a building stock that is absolutely lethal

Peter Caplehorn, Scott Brownrigg

Evans and Caplehorn stress that an independent third-party system of certification is vital to keep buildings safe. Evans says without it there would be an inevitable temptation to cut corners. Caplehorn makes the same point with greater force: “If we don’t have independent third-party adjudication it would be a disaster,” he says. “We’d end up with a building stock that is absolutely lethal.”

Independent third-party adjudication is welcomed even by those experts who are more than capable of self-certifying. Terry Dix, director of Arup’s services division, says a third party is particularly valuable in situations where engineers come up with innovative solutions that do not follow guidance. “All the regulations need a degree of interpretation,” he says. “You may come up with a way of satisfying the regulations without following the accompanying guidance. Where would you go for approval for those variations?”

If the communities department does press ahead with full-project self-certification, where would it be used? “If it were me, I would do it in the large commercial and housebuilding sectors,” says Everall, who used to be charge of building regulations at the old Office of the Deputy Prime Minister. “There are more professional people working there.” This would leave building control looking after the domestic sector, which has more than its share of cowboy builders, but little excitement or variety. “It would become increasingly difficult to recruit people if they knew they had 40 years of inspecting house extensions ahead of them,” he says.

Self-certification is not the only option. According to the review, others include giving councils greater enforcement powers. For example, by extending the period that councils have for prosecuting breaches of the regulations from six months to two years, stiffer penalties and the power to issue “stop” notices. Another idea is to extend the pre-approved Robust Details scheme.

Another possibility, of course, is to give building control departments enough resources to do their jobs, including checking for compliance with Part L. Everall makes the point that building control has to work according to a fixed schedule of fees, and that what is paid to the council does not necessarily come back to the building control department.

Approved inspectors, in contrast, can charge what they like, which according to Everall means local authorities compete with one hand tied behind their back. More money would buy the training and the staff they need to offer a better service. “The issue is how well they are trained, how many of them there are and how well they do their job,” says John Tebbit, the industry affairs director of the Construction Products Association. “The key thing is making sure they are resourced.”

Caplehorn thinks the real problem is the sheer complexity of the Building Regulations. He says: “It’d be much better to go back to the core thing which is the regulations.”

He adds: “If they did get rid of Building Control they would just replace it with something else that would cause massive confusion and end up being identical. It’d be bonkers.”

What is likely to happen? The communities department’s review will be followed by a consultation on the subject, due to be published at the end of this year. Everall says the department has reassured him that it is not going to get rid of building control, and has said full project self-certification is “less likely” than feared. But Everall is all too aware that John Callcutt, the chief executive of English Partnerships, is reviewing the delivery of housing, as is the Office of Fair Trading. If they come to the same initial conclusions as the communities department, those responsible for policing the Building Regulations will be looking over their shoulders for some time to come.