FIA pushes for review of Building Regulations Gateway system delays

The delays being realised are “inevitable”, suggests the Trade Association, due to higher expectations for regulatory approval. In point of fact, the FIA entirely supports the higher standards that have been brought forward.

However, the FIA feels that the new requirements also include some “unnecessarily difficult procedures”. Given that construction cannot start before approval is obtained, this is causing huge delays to projects starting on site.

In turn, these delays are exerting a significant effect on the construction sector and its associated industries, which the FIA believes to be counter to the Government’s plans for the construction of new homes.

Gateway 2

Gateway 2 occurs at the Building Regulations application stage. It requires building designs to be submitted and approved before commencement of any construction. That is a change from previous approaches where construction could begin on-site when the design was continuing. The FIA broadly supports this change.

The Gateway 2 application needs to include much more documentation than was previously required, such as statements on the competency of designers and contractors as well as information as to how quality control checks will be carried out. The FIA strongly support these aspects of the regulations. However, there are aspects of the processes under the new Gateway 2 that are so stringent, according to the FIA’s members, that it’s extremely difficult to gain approval, meaning significant delays to the construction of any new high-risk buildings in England.

In addition, while the Building Safety Regulator has published some guidance on Gateway 2 submissions, in addition to a FAQ web page, neither address some of the key issues. Works on existing buildings are also affected, as they too must go through the Gateway 2 process. This realises delays to remedial projects as well as new-builds.

Level of detail

The FIA’s Fire Engineering Council has observed: “The Building Safety Regulator does not clearly state what level of detail is expected for design submissions. It’s likely to require full, ‘construction stage’ design for virtually the entire building, which is a huge commitment at an early stage of a construction project. However, the absence of clarity on this is causing huge variations within the industry, with some design teams making submissions based on just the concrete frame design and others submitting early stage designs, resulting in wasted resource for designers submitting applications and for the Building Safety Regulator when reviewing them.

Further, the Building Safety Regulator refuses pre-submission technical consultation with design teams. According to the FIA, this seems to have been implemented in order to avoid the previous bad practice of design teams asking Building Control personnel for input on building design.

While the FIA agrees that this habitual bad practice must stop, a complete refusal to engage prior to submission – and particularly so for highly complex designs – means that designs will be rejected due to differences of opinion between the design team and the Registered Building Inspectors.

Redesign costs

In addition, if a design is rejected due to disagreements on aspects of the design that affect layouts (eg the number of lift shafts or the locations of stairs), this may result in huge redesign costs.

Once designs have been submitted, the Registered Building Inspector would typically produce a list of comments that need to be addressed (eg clarifications on certain issues or challenges on aspects where the Registered Building Inspector does not consider the design to be sufficient). That’s a normal process, and typically the design team would discuss those issues with the Registered Building Inspector in order to help resolve the issues.

That said, the Building Safety Regulator is refusing any direct contact between the design team and the Registered Building Inspector, which makes that process much more difficult, time consuming and inefficient.

“Developing a design that’s acceptable for a Gateway 2 submission is a huge task,” notes the FIA, “requiring significant financial outlay. The result of the changes described means that, as a minimum, very extensive delays and, at worst, the inability to gain approval for complex designs. With building legally unable to commence until Gateway 2 approval is secured, the result is a drastic reduction of new high-risk building construction projects starting on site.”

Gateway 3

Gateway 3 sign-off occurs on completion of the works. It requires an application to the Building Safety Regulator with all relevant documentation. The Building Safety Regulator has two months to consider the application. If satisfied, the building is then approved. Occupation by the owner or operator cannot occur until Gateway 3 is cleared.

This means that, on completion, all buildings will sit empty for up to two months, but any delays (eg caused by disputes or discrepancies in documentation) will mean more completed buildings being unused for longer.

Gateway 3 will mainly apply to projects which went through Gateway 2, so there will be no new-build projects going through Gateway 3 for some time, but the FIA anticipates that this could create further delays in times ahead.

Key recommendations

The FIA recommends an “urgent review” of Gateway 2 and 3 processes and consideration as to how these might be simplified. The Trade Association would emphasise that high standards of competence and quality control should be maintained. The focus for the review should be on the processes, particularly so in those areas where the additional complexity doesn’t improve building quality.

At present, the focus is squarely on Gateway 2, but in the future Gateway 3 should also be considered. One option would be to allow applications to be submitted in steps, with initial submission to include the General Arrangement Plans and ‘high level’ documents (such as the fire strategy). Once initial approval has been secured, building designers would then have the confidence to develop and submit more detailed plans.

Construction should only be allowed to commence once the design has been approved, which may take multiple step submissions. While there would be a need to develop this process in more detail, if implemented it would allow a more efficient review process without compromising the independence of the Building Safety Regulator.

In addition, further guidance on issues such as the extent of the design information that’s required would be “very beneficial”. This would reduce the wasted time and effort incurred by design teams and the Building Safety Regulator in submitting and reviewing designs which are at an inappropriate design stage.