Steve Evans BSc (Hons) MBA C.Build.E FCABE
Senior Area Technical Manager
National House Building Council (NHBC)
Tell me, did you feel different when you woke up on October 1st 2015? Did you wake with a sense that nothing was going to be the same again or that there was now no turning back?
Of course you didn’t, but October 1st was a key date in the evolution of the building regulations system in England, ranked alongside the first ever regulations following the Great Fire of London in 1666 and the introduction of functional regulations and Approved documents in 1985. I am of course talking about the introduction of Optional Regulations which can be imposed by Local Planning Authorities as part of the planning process but will then be enforced by Building Control. In this issue, Diane Marshall, Head of Technical Services at NHBC outlines the way that the system will work and the key areas covered by the changes including the new mandatory Security Regulations for all new homes.
Diane also covers another landmark event in her article, the 30th anniversary of NHBC Building Control, the first and still the largest Approved Inspector to be licenced by government following the introduction of competition to the building control market in 1985. Now I do remember the day that NHBC first started to do Building Control as that was the exact day I actually started my working life after leaving school and joining a local architect as a Trainee Architectural Technician (or Technologist as they now prefer to be called).
My time in the architect’s office didn’t last long and I soon fell into my career in Building Control with a small Local Authority in rural Leicestershire. Now, as I look back at myself and having worked on both sides of the competitive divide I can speak with experience about how much the building control profession has come on in those 30 years, and the changes that have been introduced into the regulations. Not only is the industry far more professional and customer focused, but it works far more collaboratively with customers, helping them to meet their obligations and achieve compliance with the regulations. This will be no different as the industry adapts to meet the new challenges that the world of Optional Regulations presents. â–
