The Association of Consultant Approved Inspectors (ACAI) which represents private sector building control consultancies and inspectors in England and Wales has welcomed the announcement today of the Government’s formal consultation into the future of building control.

Paul Timmins, chairman of the ACAI, said:

“The building control system we have at the moment needs improvement. But there’s nothing so fundamentally wrong that means it needs to be abolished, and there’s no problem we haven’t already got solutions for. Our system provides both compliance and consumer confidence, and is the envy of the rest of the world.

“We are delighted that this consultation process is addressing our wish list for the future. Working with the Building Control Alliance, the ACAI will continue to lobby for changes to ensure builders get better customer support, more warning and input into new regulations and a more professional service overall.”

Commenting on some of the specific changes that the ACAI wants to see imposed on all building control bodies, including its members and local authorities, Paul Timmins said:

“Approved Inspectors have always adopted a risk-based approach to site inspections, which means an intelligently targeted service and tailor-made inspection regime to reflect the risk in a building’s design. The builder gets an independent pair of eyes on site at the most critical times for that specific project. That sort of approach should now be adapted for use by the public sector too and statutory notifications ditched.”

He also makes a strong case for better evaluation and accountability to the client:

“We want to see proper performance indicators based on quality rather than quantity, and much more transparent monitoring. There should be a single, national auditing system that checks up on all building control services, public and private sector. That way we can really demonstrate the value of building control to the whole development community.”

The ACAI is also supporting calls for changes to the way Building Regulations could be amended and communicated in the future.

“The changes to Part L in 2006 and the disastrous way these were foisted onto the construction industry have taught everyone a harsh lesson,” says Paul Timmins.

“Here were highly complex regulations, brought in two years earlier than expected. They were published just three weeks before they were supposed to be implemented, without adequate or even accurate supporting guidance, to an industry which was entirely unprepared and has struggled to comply ever since.

“That’s why we’re calling for a clear route map for how Regulations will change from now on. We should have a fixed four or five year cycle for the review of Regulations, which should then be published at least nine months before they must be implemented. We also want to see the Approved Documents and other guidance written in plain English and split into documents for residential and commercial projects. It’s the only way to make this guidance comprehensible.

“Government should involve us, the regulators, in writing future guidance because we know how the regulations are applied, what works and what doesn’t. We need more effective regulations, not necessarily fewer or more. Better regulation and its pragmatic application is everything that Approved Inspectors stand for.”

About the Government’s consultation on the future of building control

The Department for Communities and Local Government (CLG) has published its consultation document today, 18 March 2008. This follows an earlier discussion document from CLG, ‘The Future of Building Control’, published in March 2007 and a detailed response from the Building Control Alliance, ‘A Building Control System for the 21st Century’, published in July 2007.