Another blow to Building Control

In an industry besieged with challenges, will the insolvency of the Assent Group (comprised of Assent Building Control, LB Building Control and Oculus Building Control) (“Assent”) be a knock too far for the sector?

The entities, which undertook building control functions for both higher-risk buildings (“HRBs”) and non-HRBs, entered liquidation last Thursday. While clearly a critical issue for the industry, what appears to be a somewhat welcome change – as compared to various other sector set-backs such as the TriFire ordeal earlier this year – was the Health and Safety Executive’s publication the following day (“HSE”) outlining the impact of the companies’ liquidation.

Cancellation notices
Following the appointment of the Official Receiver, it is understood that cancellation notices have been issued to Assent customers with live projects.

Non-HRBs

Within its publication, the HSE confirms that work on non-HRBs can continue; however, arrangements must be made for the work to be inspected.
Furthermore, within seven (7) days of receipt of a cancellation notice a party must (a) appoint another registered building control approver (“RBCA”), and (b) ensure that that RBCA submits an initial notice, failing which the project will revert to the local authority.

HRBs

The situation will however be extremely trying for HRB projects, all of which will revert to the Building Safety Regulator (“BSR”). Furthermore, the HSE’s publication is very clear of the consequences of a cancellation notice for an HBR:

(a) work must stop and no further building work described in the initial notice can be carried out until the party receives a notice of valid application from the BSR; and

(b) the party must apply to the BSR for building control approval to restart work.

Along with links to guidance on what applications must contain, the HSE’s publication helpfully stipulates that application titles should be marked with “formerly Assent/LB/Oculus”, presumably to help streamline the processing of such applications.

Access to project information
A further useful item of information within the HSE’s publication relates to access to a party’s information held by the Assent-entities, with a link to the Insolvency Services’ announcement of the appointment of the Official Receiver.

Next steps
If you are impacted by Assent’s insolvency, it is advisable to act quickly to ensure that:

1. where possible and desired, you immediately engage another RBCA;
2. where working on an HRB, you stop work and make an application to the BSR; and
3. in all cases, you access your information from Assent.

The Assent Group’s insolvency is an extremely harsh blow to the industry. While the HSE’s guidance does not provide the answers many developers will desire (especially those of HRBs), it does at least provide timely information, something which has not always been the case. That being said, there are reports that the BSR was informed months ago of Assent’s financial issues; thus, leading to questions as to whether something could and should have been done by the BSR.

This event also leads one to wonder about the Grenfell Inquiry’s Recommendations 22 and 23, being that an independent panel needs to consider “whether it is in the public interest for building control functions to be performed by those who have a commercial interest in the process” and if in fact, “all building control functions should be performed by a national authority”. Will Assent’s insolvency tip the scale in favour of a decision to shift all building control functions to a national authority? Would such change in fact benefit the sector? Can any change be implied quick enough to ensure the industry can progress the Government’s goals of (a) building 1.5 million new homes and (b) remediating all buildings 11m+ with life critical building safety defects both by 2029? Or will the move away from private RBCAs just compound the construction sector’s misery as yet more projects are added to the BSR’s backlog?

If you have questions about building safety issues, please contact Brenna Baye or any other member of our Building Safety and Cladding Remediation Team.