New Building Safety Regulator
10 Dec 2023
As you may be aware the Building Safety Regulator became the responsible authority for building regulations on high rise buildings on 1st October 2023.
DLUHC BC Letter
The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities wrote to all Local Government Chief Executives and Heads of Building Control in England on 31st October 2023 with further details. Conveyancing searches get a brief mention on page 6 of the letter including reference to local authorities “maintaining their local land charges” (sic). LLCI and the Law Society are pressing DLUHC for details of how information about applications will be passed from the Regulator to local authorities to ensure CON29 answers are up to date and accurate. At present no system is in place and the creation of one seems some way away.
While awaiting the establishment of a suitable data exchange mechanism you may wish to include the following informative under questions 1.1j, k and l:
From 1st October 2023 the Building Safety Regulator became the Building Control Authority for high-rise buildings.
High-rise buildings are defined as having 7 or more storeys and/or being 18 metres or more high, and either having at least 2 residential units or being hospitals or care homes (during design and construction).
Enquiries should be made with the Building Safety Regulator for answers to questions 1.1j,k & l for applications received on high rise buildings since 1stOctober 2023.
For further information please visit https://www.hse.gov.uk/building-safety/regulator.htm. Information on the Regulator is also available here Building Safety Hub | Building Safety Regulator . You may also wish to make enquiries of developers of new buildings and/or managing agents of existing buildings.