Report on the recent Building Safety Regulator (BSR) audit of the Council’s Building Control function, requested by the Corporate Director (Finance and IT) and Section 151 Officer and Corporate Governance, Performance and Procurement Manager.

Members received a report of the Head of Planning and Building Control (A.3) which outlined the recent Building Safety Regulator (BSR) audit of the Council’s Building Control function, which had been requested by the Corporate Director (Finance & IT) and Section 151 Officer and the Corporate Governance, Performance and Procurement Manager.

It was reported that this was the first ever BSR review completed and that Tendring District Council had no outstanding matters to address.

The Committee heard that in December 2024 Tendring District Council had been advised that the BSR would be undertaking an audit of its building control services. That had been the Council’s first audit following the creation of the BSR and Tendring District Council was one of many authorities being reviewed.  Tendring District Council was required to operate in accordance with the Building Act and Operational Standards Rules (OSRs), which set out the minimum performance standards expected. All authorities would be subject to ongoing monitoring and have at least one inspection over a five-year period.

The inspection of services had been carried out via online interviews and requests of information on the processes, including samples of work.  Those inspections had mainly occurred during April, May and June 2025. 

It was reported that the official BSR Letter of Contravention had been received on the 29 October 2025.  That letter had detailed their findings and recommendations for action and were summarised as follows:

-       Policies, procedures, and processes were not fully documented. There was no documented approach for allocating work based on building types and Registered Building Inspector (RBI) registration. Lack of documented procedures for supervising RBIs working outside their registration class and for statutory consultations. Gaps in arrangements for monitoring and managing building control projects, including scheduling and delivery of inspections. No documented criteria for prioritising, timing, or reviewing caseloads. 1,291 open projects with outstanding completion certificates and no follow-up.

-       Insufficient resourcing, including a lack of comprehensive assessment of RBI resource requirements. No effective controls for ensuring RBIs act within their competence and registration. Gaps in record-keeping for statutory consultations. Unclear governance and oversight, particularly regarding terms of engagement and outsourced service providers (e.g., Babergh Mid Suffolk District Council). No assurance that outsourced providers comply with OSRs and legal requirements.

-       Unawareness of the duty to inform statutory consultees of decisions and reasons for accepting or declining recommendations.

It was further reported that to resolve those points the letter had instructed Tendring District Council to implement an operational manual, resource the building control function adequately, improve record-keeping and controls for statutory consultations and ensure all statutory requirements were met, and strengthen governance regarding outsourced services.

The Head of Planning and Building Control had noted that the wording used in the BSR’s Contravention was unhelpful, as closer examination often revealed that a single, typically minor, issue could relate to multiple BSR standards.

Procedure Documentation

It was noted that, although Building Control had followed the correct processes, not all procedures had been formally documented, and certain requirements were only clarified by the BSR during the audit.

In some instances, it had been assumed that particular elements were already covered under adopted LABC requirements or were sufficiently defined through established practice. During the audit, however, the BSR had provided further interpretation of the OSRs and/or requested explicit articulation of areas that had not previously been highlighted.

An example of this concerned the handling of open cases. Legislation provided no mechanism to close a case when a builder ceased work for any reason. In accordance with statutory requirements, such cases were kept open even when sites became inactive. The BSR had considered this approach to be unsatisfactory from a governance perspective without additional explanation. In response, the service has now introduced its own criteria for case closure and was seeking assurance from the BSR that those criteria were acceptable and did not introduce risk. While the criteria were considered logical, they would inevitably differ from those adopted by other authorities.

Definitions and criteria developed through this process have been shared with other authorities, who in turn have shared their own interpretations, reflecting the continued absence of formal guidance from the BSR.

Outsourcing to Partners and Oversight

Building Control outsources certain functions—such as plan checking and some inspection support—to partner authorities and relies on their expertise and professional judgement. As the partner authority is itself a local authority and an active LABC member, compliance with all building regulations and BSR requirements had been assumed.

The BSR had, however, deemed this assumption insufficient. Consequently, additional checks had now been introduced to strengthen oversight of outsourced work upon its return.

Consultee Reporting

Under the BSR’s new OSRs, all consultee responses must be recorded, together with the officer’s decision to accept or reject the advice. While consultee responses had been consistently documented, the officer’s acceptance or rejection of that advice had not previously been recorded.

It was emphasised that, since the introduction of the new regulations, the service had not disagreed with any consultee response. For example, where the Fire Service had identified a fire risk, there was no basis on which such advice could be challenged.

Going forward, the service would explicitly record whether consultee advice was accepted or declined, along with the rationale, within the case file. This constituted a minor but necessary procedural amendment.

It was further noted that, at no point had this Council’s Building Control team acted outside the Building Regulations or the Act; all matters raised related solely to the BSR’s expectations and interpretation.

Action

The BSR’s position and recommendations had been reviewed and accepted. The operations manual, which was already in development, had been updated to incorporate all relevant BSR judgements. A new sign?off form had also been introduced for use by partner authorities when undertaking plan?checking work on the Council’s behalf. In addition, the Building Control team was increasing the number of domestic plan checks completed in?house to reduce reliance on outsourcing, although some external support would remain necessary due to inspector grading requirements.

As a result of those changes, all Building Control policies, procedures and processes were now fully documented and appropriately signposted. A new “hibernation” process had been introduced for inactive cases which could not legally be closed, reducing the number of open cases to approximately five hundred, covering a three?year period. Adjustments to partnership arrangements had addressed the issues raised, and consultee responses were now recorded as a specific task within each case file.

In conclusion, the updated governance manual and the Council’s responses to the issues identified had been submitted to the Building Safety Regulator. On 12 January 2026, the BSR had confirmed:

“Thank you for confirming the actions you have taken to address the non-compliance with the Operational Standards Rules identified during the inspection and confirmed within the letter of contravention dated 29.10.25. We confirm that no further information is required, and this matter is now concluded.”

The matters raised during the BSR audit were therefore considered resolved. Some adjustments were required due to aspects of the BSR’s requirements that had only become clear during the audit process.

It was unanimously RESOLVED that the contents of the report A.3 be noted.