On 30 June, the housing ministry announced a major series of reforms to the regulator it had set up just two years ago to oversee the new regime for constructing high-rise residential buildings.

Gone was the existing management, to be replaced by a new chair and chief executive – respectively former fire officers Andy Roe and Charlie Pugsley – with the body itself shifted wholesale out of the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) to become an independent agency of the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG).

The move followed a troubled start for the Building Safety Regulator (BSR), set up under the auspices of the post-Grenfell Building Safety Act. It had lost control of decision-making timelines, resulting in developers waiting nearly a year on average to get an approval. According to the BSR’s own figures, more than 33,000 homes are currently held in a backlog awaiting construction approval.

…