Blog archive

The Building Safety Act 2022 (BSA) has brought about sweeping changes to the scope of the Defective Premises Act 1972 (DPA) and, importantly, to limitation.

The Chancellor’s 2023 spring Budget included a number of reforms and spending promises designed to improve the planning system in England. This included greater support for nutrient neutrality in response to nutrient pollution which is “a major barrier to the government’s ambition of delivering 300,000 homes per year”.

Chancellor’s first budget of 2023 may have been called a “Back to Work” budget but it included some key measures focused on infrastructure and development, and the government’s commitment to achieve net zero by 2050. Here is a summary of the key points for the construction industry:

The Building Safety Act 2022  has introduced a new cause of action  (as from 28 June 2022). Anyone with a legal or equitable interest in any relevant building or dwelling has a cause of action against an appropriate person (usually a construction product manufacturer) if the following 4 conditions are met;

Introduced by the Building Safety Act 2022 (the BSA), and in force as of 28 June 2022, Building Liability Orders (BLO) essentially pierce the corporate veil by providing a mechanism through which the costs of remedying building safety risks

Remediation Contribution Orders came into force on 28 June 2022.

In December 2022 the Government launched a consultation (which runs until March 17) on the following: New residential buildings over 30 metres (around 10 storeys) to be required to have 2 staircases.  It said that there would  be a very short transition period for this and the consultation encourages all developments to prepare for this change now            Sprinkler systems to be installed in new care homes of all heights (or as an alternative with a minimum of 10 beds as the threshold).

Last week saw the announcement of a set of amendments to the NEC4 suite of contracts.  These amendments follow those issued in January 2019 and October 2020.

Valentine’s Day 2022 is the day which the Building Safety Act decrees is the date to be used to ascertain if a lease is a “qualifying lease” (see blogs by Kate Rushworth  and Lauren Michaelides as to what are qualifying leases and what that means for both landlords and leaseholders). The 14 February 2022 is known in the Act as  “the qualifying time”.

Our building safety blogs over the last few weeks have explained what, if any, contributions can be sought from a landlord from leaseholders for remedial works for cladding and building safety risks where these work are required to be undertaken to buildings which are at least 11 metres or 5 storeys high and contain at least two dwellings.  However, what happens if the landlord does not undertake the necessary cladding or building safety risk works? 

To explain landlord and leaseholder certificates, it is worth a reminder that: A building safety risk is set out in the Building Safety Act as a “risk to the safety of people in or about the building arising from the spread of fire or structural failure”; and Landlords will be required to pay for all costs for building safety risks where the Landlord as ‘involved’ in the works and/or they meet a certain financial threshold.

Leaseholders may be required to contribute to the cost of remedying a building safety risk.