DAME JUDITH Hackitt said that construction and built environment firms failing to plan for the new building safety regulator are ‘morally indefensible’, and will not survive under the new system.
BD Online reported on Dame Judith’s comments at the Construction Leaders’ Summit, where she warned the sector that firms ‘will not survive’ the new system under the Building Safety Bill ‘unless senior staff start making changes now’. She added that ‘I suspect that some of you are already doing the sums in your heads and working on the assumption that if the legislation doesn’t come into force until 2023, that leaves a period of two to three years before you really need to worry about this and about changes to current practices and behaviours.
‘Allow me to suggest to you that to do that is akin to going out on a big party on a night before lockdown in the current pandemic. You’re knowingly taking a risk that you don’t need to, and which you shouldn’t, and you are ignoring the potential consequences. It is also morally indefensible’. Asked how they should begin preparing, Dame Judith said that ‘the place to be starting this is in boardrooms. And I think in every organisation, if that conversation hasn’t already started, it should’.
A ‘change of culture’ requiring more focus on collaboration between firms working on a project would be ‘key’, and Dame Judith said in turn: ‘If someone is not doing what they’re required to do as part of their duties, then they can expect that to get picked up by the regulator. But that’s also a question for the industry and the supply chain – the laggards, the dinosaurs are the ones who are going to drop off the end. People will choose to work with people who want to collaborate.’
Another warning she gave saw her note that procurement processes such as design and build, suggested to have ‘limit[ed] the safety of buildings’, would ‘not survive’ in their current form after the regulations change. Dame Judith said: ‘It will survive if it changes. Any part of this sector who thinks they can survive by standing still or defending their current territory is sadly mistaken.
‘Every single part of the industry, including the whole design and build philosophy, needs to think about what is its role in delivering building safety, sustainability, responding to those new needs. It has to be about ‘adapt and change’ if you’re going to survive. Would you really want your loved ones, children or your elderly relatives living in the buildings which you are responsible for, or which you’ve had a hand in putting in place?
‘This isn’t just a moral question but one of ’how do you and your company satisfy yourself that the buildings are safe.’