High risk buildings - verification during construction: compliance plan approach - background and implementation

7. Compliance Plan Manager

As part of the CPA to compliance with building regulations and standards the role of Compliance Plan Manager (CPM) will be introduced on defined building warrant projects.

The CPM will be introduced as a mandatory requirement after legislation is amended, when the role and its appointment by the RP is defined. It is anticipated that as a minimum a Compliance Plan Manager will be a construction professional and have accreditation from an anticipated industry led CPM competency scheme.

The CPM is appointed by the RP (normally the building owner), not the builder or developer. The only time in terms of appointment where this cannot be the case is where the owner is the developer/builder.

This is to ensure that the CPM can act without bias, or conflict of interest, and provide their core function of supporting persons whose role it is to submit the building warrant Completion Certificate to meet their statutory requirements.

The CPM must be a competent construction professional with a significant range of knowledge and experience across a wide and often unpredictable variety of contexts.

The Compliance Plan Approach is built on a principle of transparency of actions and behaviours.

Planned actions to evidence compliance with building regulations are recorded on the building warrant compliance plan, together with identification of those expected and contracted to deliver the evidence.

The Compliance Plan will subsequently be updated by the CPM and local authority verifier to record the success, or otherwise of the planned actions.

The CPM role is to provide continuity of compliance oversight from design to completion on behalf of the RP; professional oversight to manage the building standards compliance process from start to finish.

The CPM’s role is not to replace the responsibility of others, contractually or ethically, to deliver a building which complies with the building regulations.

Note - The role description below is under review with professional bodies and is subject to change, refinement and clarification. A final role description will be provided prior to legislative change.

The role entails:

• Being appointed by the RP as CPM to act in their building standards compliance interests and required to be in place from prewarrant stage (a new application requirement for defined building projects) to acceptance of completion certificate.
• Accountable to the RP for analysis, diagnosis and confirmation of the design realisation through and by the execution of construction work relating to the assembly of the structure, fabric and services in compliance with building standards regulations and guidance.
• Identifying the building standards compliance risks on a project by project basis, determining how compliance for these risks can be evidenced, and monitoring the development and delivery phases.
• Relying on the design and delivery team retained by the RP, requiring these individuals or entities to prepare risk assessments, review these during design development and then at tender to ensure that they were satisfied that they were reasonable having regard to the scale, scope, and complexity of the project.
• Report to the RP any observed or documented concerns over the capacity or competence of the design and delivery team, as regards compliance with building regulations.
• Being responsible for overseeing that the CP is fully developed and subsequently fully executed and achieved, from the building warrant pre-application discussion stage through to completion of the project, on behalf of the RP.
• Monitoring responsibility for the delivery of compliance evidence by others and for the management of building standards compliance evidencing for the various phases of a construction project.
• Working in collaboration with the design team and contractor to identify the compliance risks, inspection needs and information/documents to be gathered and collated.
• An example of this collaboration would be understanding the projects proposed use of contractor designed portions, as this is essential in identifying the risk this form of procurement may provide to the procedural success of staged warrant applications and certification of design.
• Working with the design team and contractor to develop and agree the compliance evidence required by the RP to enable the lawful submission of the completion certificate at the end of the project. Examples of the principles of this approach can be found with the CQIC approach to quality planning.^[17]
• Confirming readiness and managing notification of the verifier when stages of construction identified in the CP are ready for inspection or other checks.
• Monitoring progression of building warrant submissions, granted approvals, advising the contractor and RP that works must not start without a warrant or progress beyond the approved stage, and there should be no occupation without completion certificate acceptance having been issued.
• Acting as the point of contact for verifiers to arrange verification inspections or checks should arrangement through the contractor fail.
• Monitoring that design and delivery professionals have evidenced their advice to the RP regarding building standards compliance.
• Provide information and updates to the RP on matters of compliance at appropriate intervals and when issues arise requiring the RP’s attention - to take place during the design and construction stages then prior to the RP submitting the completion certificate.
• During the delivery phase requiring regular submission of reports, certificates, and test data based on the compliance plan from the design and delivery team. These would be interrogated to ensure that they seemed reasonable.
• Maintaining and compiling the agreed record of compliance evidence to support the submission of the completed CP and the completion certificate, on completion of the project.^[18]
• Maintaining and compiling the agreed compliance evidence required by the building standards verifier in servicing their need to carry our reasonable inquiry into the certification of compliance submitted by the RP through the completion certificate submission.^[19]
• Co-ordinating through the compliance plan and project quality systems, inspections by others, including the designer, sub-contractors, and any other specialists, where work requires to be certified or commissioned.
• Reporting to the building standards verifier if works are allowed to progress beyond the stages approved, if the building is occupied without completion certificate acceptance or temporary occupation or if any non-compliance recorded/reported by the project is not properly remediated or notified to the building standards verifier.

The level of site based activity to be undertaken by the CPM will be dependent on their risk assessment of the supervision of work proposed and delivered by contractors. CPM site activity should focus on confirming and authorising the notifiable verification stages and monitoring that warrant stages are completed in accordance with the approved stage plans.

Site based activity would also be expected to be undertaken to monitor the inspections of others in relation to their reporting and evidencing requirements through the Compliance Plan and wider through the project’s quality planning.

For example, while it is not appropriate for the CPM to take responsibility for the work of others ^[20], it is appropriate that in monitoring that Compliance Plan evidence is being robustly provided, interrogation of the actions of others may be appropriate to ensure they deliver on their contractual duty to the project.

The CPM duties will be discharged when the approved CP is completed and delivered, the completion certificate accepted by the verifier and the owner is provided with the building warrant compliance information.

It is intended that through legislative change, that the CPM will have a duty to report to the verifier, prior to completion certificate acceptance, any non-compliance with the building warrant and building regulations which have not otherwise been notified to the verifier.

While this description is intended to provide a consistent framework, it is recognised that some RP’s will be more aware of the requirements placed upon them by legislation than others.

The CPM should therefore enter contract with an RP in full knowledge of the RP’s awareness levels, take early steps to make the RP aware of their statutory responsibilities under the Building (Scotland) Act 2003 and plan appropriately.