Building Regulations News Roundup - April 2007

A brief synopsis of some of the key news items related to technical guidance, construction practice, and new regulations that you might have missed in the press.

Archeological risk in construction
A new research report is in production by CIRIA, Managing archaeological risk in construction (RP741). The guidance will aim to highlight the potential risks associated with poor practice or non-compliance during the planning, design and construction process and demonstrate the ways in which archaeology or heritage matters may enhance or add value to a development.

For more information visit http://www.ciria.org/rp741.htm.

CDM 2007
The health and safety file – The Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2007 (CDM 2007) are on course to come into force on 6 April 2007, despite concern from some groups. The Forum of Private Business (FPB) has protested over CDM 2007 urging MPs to oppose Regulations that it says would leave small businesses burdened with extra responsibilities when having building work carried out. However, the Regulations are on the HSE’s list of commencement dates for April and the accompanying ACoP has now been officially published. For more information see the Work place law website.

Commons debate for CDM regulations
The Conservative Party has secured a parliamentary debate on the new CDM Regulations over fears on long-term liability for construction firms. Ten MPs have signed an Early Day Motion calling for the CDM regulations to be ‘annulled’. Shadow construction minister Mark Prisk said: “We want to get the minister to give us a clear explanation on where everyone stands on liability after construction work ends.”
Construction News Plus, 26th March 2007

Construction Industry Scheme
HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) has now published to help subcontractors when the New Construction Industry Scheme (CIS) starts on 6 April 2007. The Factsheets have been translated into Albanian, Bulgarian, Czech, Hungarian, Latvian, Lithuanian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Slovakian and Turkish. The Factsheets that have been translated so far are:

• CIS 342 - Registering for New CIS - advice for subcontractors
• CIS 343 - Applying to be paid gross - advice for subcontractors
• CIS 344 - Getting paid by a contractor - advice for subcontractors

The Factsheets are available on the HMRC website.

Construction procurement for the 21st century global construction survey 2007
Examines the views of owners, chief executives and senior executives of leading global companies on the challenges facing them in planning and procuring major construction projects. View the survey on the KPMG website.
RICS Knowledge Alert, 29th March 2007

Dubai to recycle construction debris
Construction sites in Dubai will soon have to send all their construction and demolition (C&D) waste for recycling. Dubai Municipality made the announcement at Wednesday's launch of Emirates Recycling, a new company dedicated to the recycling and recovery of Dubai's construction and demolition (C&D) waste. Emirates Recycling, which is backed by the Al Rostamani Group, will operate an AED 65 million plant that has the ability to recycle waste material into usable road and construction base aggregate. The plant has a reported processing capacity of 8 million tons annually, enough to ensure that incoming material is processed quickly and stockpiles are avoided. For more on this story visit: www.arabianbusiness.com.
ArchNewsNow.com, 28th March 2007

Future of Building Control
Angela Smith, minister for Building Regulations, this week published The Future of Building Control, outlining how the system can be improved:

• Moving away from a piecemeal approach to Building Regulations review and towards a longer fixed-term cycle with planned pauses and a clear indication of future changes
• Providing greater enforcement powers for local authorities to tackle persistent offenders
• Providing simple guidance that helps with specific building work or types of problems
• Finding out how to make sure building control bodies are properly funded into the future.

To read the report visit: www.communities.gov.uk.

Government procurement
The Office of Government Commerce has outlined plans for the effective management of the Government's Estate, which it considers an integral element of Transforming government procurement. Managing the civil estate strategically can release significant funds that can be redeployed to critical front-line services, it can help economic regeneration around the UK, and it can help the Government to reach sustainability goals through better management of buildings and property. Opportunities have been identified to make savings of between £1 billion and £1.5 billion a year by 2013 through reduction and rationalisation of the government’s holdings, mainly through relocation from London and the South East, and through improved procurement of facilities management and leases. The plans will be outlined at the IPD Occupiers/CBI Property in Business Conference 2007.

For further information see the PDF from the HM Treasury website.

New register to monitor building control
The DCLG has launched a consultation paper that proposes to improve building control’s record keeping. The new Building Control Information Registers aims to provide more consistency of information and costs in building control activity. Local authorities are already required to keep public registers containing information relating to the building control activities of approved inspectors and competent persons, but they are not obliged to keep information which relate to their own building control functions.
Building Online, 21st March 2007

SOLA additions
The latest editions of the UK Pesticide Guide and The e-UK Pesticide Guide now offer the most comprehensive information on specific off-label approvals (SOLAs) in one publication. The guides also contain information on the latest legislative changes and environmental guidance. Go to www.ukpesticideguide.co.uk for further information.

Wimpey and Woodrow merge
Construction companies George Wimpey and Taylor Woodrow have agreed to merge in a deal that will create the UK's biggest homebuilder, worth about £5bn. The new company will be called Taylor Wimpey and will be large enough in terms of market value to merit a place on London's main FTSE 100 stock index. The new company will have a combined workforce of about 14,000. According to the firms, less than 5% of the workforce, about 700 workers will lose their jobs because of the merger. George Wimpey chief executive Peter Redfern said that most of the job losses would be in the UK.
BBC News Online,  26th March 2007

Disposal Sales Agency
An online auction website, which allows the public to bid for surplus Government equipment, including Green Goddess fire-trucks, has been launched. The Disposal Sales Agency (DSA) has expanded its existing website to include an online auction. Potential buyers can bid and pay for ex-Government items online. They can also bid through the website for items put up for sale by Government contractors. The DSA, part of the Ministry of Defence, works to dispose of surplus equipment on behalf of a number of government departments.

To access the online auction site, go to the Disposal Sales Agency website and click on the ‘auctions’ link.

RIP cigarettes
An alliance of health organisations, public sector bodies and fire services is calling for an EU-wide standard to ensure that all cigarettes produced or sold in the EU use a slightly altered shape and design that makes them much less likely to continue burning when not being smoked. In the UK, cigarettes, pipes and cigars are the biggest cause of fire deaths at home. Across Europe it’s estimated they cause at least 1,000 deaths and more than €13m (£8.7m) of damage every year. A report by the Government suggested that if the UK had conformed in 2003 to the highest standards of the safer cigarettes available in the USA, this would have cut cigarette-related fires by almost two thirds, resulting in 2,544 fewer fires and reducing deaths from 123 to 45. It is known as RIP, which stands for ‘reduced ignition propensity’. See http://www.nist.gov/public_affairs/cigarette.htm for further details.