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* 1. Please enter you details

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* 2. In-Scope Buildings:
Chapter 2 Defines the Scope and explains the risk-based process that has helped make its decision to only include HMO’s and Residential buildings above 18 meters or over. Later or immediately, other complex buildings such as, Supported/sheltered housing and non-residential halls of residence.

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* 3. Accountable Person

The Duty Holder - responsible for ensuring that building safety risks to occupants are reduced so far as is reasonably practicable.

The introduction of an Accountable Person (an office not a person) who is responsible for the management, repairs and occupation, this may be more important for private residential building where ownership and management can be unclear, but we have seen Local authority owned buildings being managed by arm’s length managing agency, who manage the occupancy and general repairs to the flats and communal areas, but major capital works still the responsibility of the LA, has this caused ambiguity? 

Ensuring all actions undertaken during the lifespan of the building in under one office of responsibility is a good idea. 

Have a general duty to promote building safety and the safety of persons in and around the building.

Do you agree with having an accountable person, do you see any problems and why should this not include existing building and have a duty to promoting safety? (Q3.5 - Q3.7 & Q4.19)

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* 4. Building Safety Manager

Responsible Person  - The building safety manager would be appointed by the accountable person and would carry out the day to day functions of ensuring that the building is safely managed and maintained, including engaging residents and overseeing safety works, and others employed in management, maintenance or checks of the building.

A building safety manager would be required to carry out their functions in accordance with the requirements in the building safety certificate and the safety case, and the accountable person would be required to register them with the building safety regulator as the building safety manager for the building(s) in which they are operating.

•     Ensuring that those employed to maintain and manage the building have the necessary skills, knowledge and experience;
•     Maintaining information management systems to facilitate safe management of the building;
•     Maintaining the safety case for the building so that risks are proactively identified and mitigating measures put in place and maintained;
•     Ensuring that necessary and appropriate building remediation is undertaken to ensure that the conditions set out in the building safety certificate are met;
•     Engaging residents in safe management of their building through a Resident
•     Engagement Strategy that includes routes of escalation for resident concerns;
•     Ensuring that fire risk assessments for the whole building are undertaken and reviewed regularly and any recommendations are undertaken in a timely manner; and
•     Being responsible for reporting mandatory occurrences to the building safety regulator.

But if where the building safety manager is no longer suitable by reason of their conduct, we propose a default position through which the building safety regulator would appoint an independent building safety ma ager. This will help to safeguard building safety and ensure that the occupants of the building can be kept safe.  All cost accrued will be charged to the Accountable Person.

In response to Q3.9 - Q3.16, Do you agree with the role, what competencies should they have, and do you think the regulator should have the power to remove them and appoint their own. In response to Q4.17, How can a Qualification/competence be shown and should that person be registered on a Third-Party register?

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* 5. Safety Case

The safety case goes further than a full fire risk assessment of a building and the HHSRS undertaken in each property and be scrutinised the building safety regulator before a building certificate is issued.

It is proposed to consider: 

•     Provide the necessary information, in a structured way, concerning the hazards affecting the building;
•     Be an argument that goes beyond a risk assessment and demonstrates that fire and structural risks, and any measures in place to manage those risks, are being managed so far as is reasonably practicable;
•     Be supported by a body of appropriate evidence;
•     Use plain language (to facilitate communication with those who need to understand the safety systems in buildings); and
•     Be kept under constant review.

The safety management system for a new building that includes:
•     A comprehensive description of the building – including information on preventive measures and protective systems.
•     An understanding of the life-critical risks (for fire and structural safety) and evidence how they are proactively and proportionally managed for safe occupation
•     Management structure employed:
•     Evidence of through regular inspection, reviews and maintenance of the building
•     Evidence of continuous improvement over time, i.e. a living document that references the most up-to-date versions of supporting evidence (including records of changes, e.g. to the technical data pack)
•     Mandatory occurrence reporting (see Part C)
•     Emergency preparedness (akin to a business continuity plan), so that appropriate actions are taken to mitigate hazards and minimise incidents (by 53 avoiding hazards altogether, reducing the frequency or reducing the consequences of hazards being realised)
•     Evidence that legislation, requirements, standards and policies applicable, have been met or complied with
•     Reference to other documents, such as a Resident Engagement Strategy, a Fire and Emergency File and any relevant structural or fire safety inspections, and other appropriate documents.

With Safety Cases for an existing (occupied) building

The above will be more complex for many existing buildings where information on the building or the safety systems within it might be limited, absent entirely or very expensive to obtain.

Therefore, where information is not available and cannot be collected, the accountable person will need to explain why this is reasonable and what steps they have taken in mitigation against the (potentially unknown) risks, so far as is reasonably practicable.

This includes the decision to undertake intrusive survey as a first step to build an accurate record to support the safety case. This could include destructive inspection and testing, such as a Type 4 fire risk assessment, which looks at the fire and structural risks. The scope of any inspection needs to be relevant to the nature of the premises and the amount known in respect of the structural protection so that the accountable person has the assurance that it provides information as to the risks that are inherent across the whole building.

Please note: This is the whole of the building, including leased commercial and residential part.

Once a relevant safety case has been obtained, this needs to be reviewed and updated on a regular basis and continued assessment and potentially intrusive surveys required to inspect the product that deteriorates such as cavity and fire barriers.

It is expected that the registration will be reviewed every five years. We propose that this will also trigger a formal review of the safety case by the building safety regulator.

Q3.11 - 3.16 Do you agree with our proposed content, Should the ongoing assessment be more precise, how will you be able to mitigate the costs of the intrusive surveys to leaseholders.

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* 6. Building Safety Certificates

The accountable person will be required by law to register with and obtain a building safety certificate for their building from the building safety regulator.

It would be a criminal offence for a person having control of a building in scope not to make a valid application for its registration.

This will be for the whole of the building an is proposed to include;

Identify the accountable person, the building safety manager, and the obligations (conditions) for ensuring the building is safe for residents.

Building safety certificate to be displayed in a prominent part of the common parts of the building and be valid for 5-years.

Q3.17 - Q3.21 Do you agree with the Building Safety Certificate, that it should be displayed and the 5 year-lifespan.

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* 7. Please note I have jumped to the residential section, this is because the interaction with the resident will change and before discussing the IT and data sharing requirements this resident engagement requirement needs to be considered.

Residents
Increase in resident involvement:
•     Proactively, rather than just on request, provide residents with the information they need in a clear and accessible format so that they understand the protections that are in place to keep their building safe;
•     Provide residents with more detailed information on building and fire safety on request;
•     Engage with residents through developing and implementing a Resident Engagement Strategy.  By developing a culture of resident engagement, we will ensure that residents are empowered to play an effective role in making sure that their building is, and remains, safe. This includes identifying and reporting hazards that may impact on the safety of the building and meeting their responsibilities to ensure their own safety and that of their neighbours;
•     Address residents’ concerns about fire and structural safety and ensure that they are resolved, with residents being able to use a clear route of escalation if their safety concerns are not being dealt with effectively.

Core information which all accountable persons will be required to provide;
a)   Measures in place to mitigate potential fire and building safety risks to residents, e.g. fire precautions;
b)   How to reduce the risk of fire in individual dwellings e.g. by not storing flammable materials;
c)   Process for reporting a fire risk and/or raising any other safety concerns;
d)   Procedures to follow where a fire occurs in the building, including for evacuation;
e)   The different roles and responsibilities of the accountable person, building safety manager and residents;
f)     Key information from the Resident Engagement Strategy e.g. contact details of the accountable person and Building Safety Manager.

The following information must be available digitally, in the appropriate languages and format:

•     Full, current and historical fire risk assessments;
•     Planned maintenance and repairs schedules;
•     Outcome of building safety inspection checks;
•     How assets in the building are managed, e.g. frequency of lift maintenance;
•     Details of preventive measures, e.g. smoke alarms;
•     Fire protection measures in place, e.g. sprinklers, fire extinguishers;
•     Information on the maintenance of fire safety systems;
•     The fire strategy for the building;
•     Structural assessments; and
•     Planned and historical changes to the building.

Failure to provide these details or resident concerns will be allowed to be reported by then to the regulator.

Resident Engagement Strategy

Building safety manager will have to work in partnership with residents to ensure that they are involved in decisions about their building’s safety.
a)   A management summary setting out how the accountable person will deliver resident involvement and participation in their buildings. and their approach to communication and to measuring the success of their resident engagement;
b)   An engagement plan for residents setting out how the strategy will work in practice in their building, what residents can expect by way of communication and how they can get involved and raise concerns.

The management summary will need to set out as a minimum:

•     Communicating with residents, including th

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* 8. Residents’ responsibilities

The reforms do recognise that the safety of a building includes the residents and also the need for their co-operation with potential changes to the access arrangement 

Residents providing reasonable information on works carried out to their property and providing reasonable access by allowing the accountable person or building safety manager to inspect and carry out necessary works (such as fitting fire alarms) or undertaking fire and structural safety-related maintenance. Where information or access is required, the accountable person or the building safety manager will provide the resident with reasonable notice.

This is not uncommon with private residential properties, but this will include leaseholders, do you think your tenancy agreements allow for this change and how do you think you leaseholder will react?

Q. 5.6. Do you think there should be a new requirement on residents of buildings in scope to co-operate with the accountable person (and the Q5.6 - Q5.8 Do you think that there should be better access to a resident property (Tenants and Leaseholder), what would be appropriate and what safeguard for residents should there be? Does this not enable better access for LGSR visits?

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* 9. Digital Standards (The Golden Thread)

The golden thread of information should operate through the whole lifecycle of a building, from design through to occupation.

Digital tools and systems to enable this information to be stored and used effectively recording the original design intent and ensuring subsequent changes to buildings are captured and preserved. The golden thread will also make information readily available, and this may include mandating BIM standard.

Handover of a new building will require the acceptance of BIM or similar data and then the requirement to maintain this information during the lifetime of the building.

For existing buildings in scope, the content of the golden thread will be started during the building safety registration process, and its creation and maintenance will be a mandatory condition of the building safety certificate. During the occupation stage for both new and existing buildings, the information that will be added to the golden thread will be the information required to build and evidence the safety cases.

Producing a golden thread for existing buildings will take longer to implement, as information on these buildings may be difficult to find and access. We propose that compiling the key dataset should be the priority and expect to require that this be created and submitted as part of the building safety registration process.

This will also require the information required to be available to the residents.

Is requiring 3D models of your complex building going too far? 

Has your organisation the capability to manage a variety of data collection systems?

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* 10. Mandatory occurrence reporting

RIDDOR type reporting for in scope building, there will be a legal responsibility on the Client, Principal Designer and Principal Contractor during design and construction and the accountable person during the occupation to establish a reporting mechanism internally and report specific occurrences and these must be reported within 72 Hours.

These would be limited to:
Overarching Categories
Occurrences relating to construction products
Occurrences relating to construction practice and poor workmanship
Occurrences relating Maintenance of fire protection SystemsSubstandard Occurrences relating the Operation of construction Products
Occurrences relating Maintenance of fire protection Systems
Occurrences relating the Operation the building safety Procedures
Occurrences relating to a major Event

Examples of specific occurrences
Substandard products delivered to site with fire or structural safety implications
Defective installation of fireproofing
Early or unexpected decay of structural components
Unexpected failure of safety critical components such as a fire door.
Defects or failure in passive or active fire protection systems
Partial or total failure of emergency fire systems
Major damage due to an extreme event (fire)

Do you agree with the system and timeframe, and the occurrences listed, or should additional element be included (Q4.10 – Q4.15).

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* 11. Oversight of competence

The group recommended that relevant professional and trade bodies should lead to the creation of an overarching competency framework, setting out the specific core knowledge, skills and behaviours required of anyone working on buildings in scope of the new regime. This should include an appropriate level of fire and structural safety knowledge as a minimum. The Competence Steering Group has proposed that this overarching competency framework could be captured and maintained in a suite of national standards (e.g. the British Standards Institution, or a Publicly Available Specification (PAS)56, and be overseen by a separate, independent, stakeholder-led standards committee.

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