Inspectors: focus on H&S

I have been involved in an on-going very lengthy dispute concerning defective fire stopping within a timber-framed apartment block.

Discovery of the buried defective fire stopping was fortuitous, ‘sparked’ by an off-the-cuff remark that an owner could smell cooking from the flat below which was emanating from an access panel in a service duct. Not only was the access panel not of 30 minutes fire integrity, but fire stopping at compartment floor level was revealed to be, to say the least, defective.

The builder refused to acknowledge his shortcomings since he cited the Building Control completion certificate as verifying that all his work had conformed to Building Regulations. Obviously this has been pointed out to him not to be the case since it is the sole responsibility of the builder to ensure conformity with the regulations.

So who should have policed this builder who was ‘ignorant’ of the technologies involved in fire-stopping a timber-framed building?

Since fire kills more people in homes than on our roads I would suggest:

• that the ethos of building control should return to its roots and be solely concerned with health and safety;
• that building control should be undertaken by a professional who has no interest in the property;
• that a professional appointed to oversee the construction of a building is fully culpable when deficiencies are found within a completed building that has been signed off as meeting the ‘reasonable standards’ of safety of the Building Regulations;
• that undertaking building control on a risk assessed basis is no excuse for sloppy, almost criminal lack of care as displayed towards the unfortunate occupants of this timber-framed building.

J S Woodhead MCIOB