Authoritative commentary on building safety compliance, the BSR regime and higher-risk buildings — written for architects, developers, contractors and duty holders navigating the Building Safety Act 2022.
Eight floors, 112 apartments, four commercial units. Our staged Gateway 2 submission for a Barnet new build was validated by the BSR in a single day. Here is how preparation, embedded compliance and BSR intimacy made the difference.
Long-form guides on the regulatory obligations that matter most to your project.
A higher-risk residential building in Chelsea. A proposed air conditioning installation. Sixteen weeks from initial instruction to approved Gateway 2 application — zero resubmissions, zero requisitions outstanding. How structured compliance preparation made the difference.
Gateway 2 is the most consequential regulatory checkpoint in the life of a higher-risk building project. This practical guide sets out exactly what the BSR requires, how to structure your submission, and how to avoid the requisitions that delay projects and cost money.
The Principal Designer (Building Regulations) role is widely misunderstood and widely misapplied. This article explains the legal duties, how they differ from CDM, what competence looks like, and what the BSR scrutinises at Gateway 2.
MOR is one of the most misunderstood obligations under the Building Safety Act regime. What must be reported, within what timeframe, and by whom — and what the consequences of non-compliance are.
The Golden Thread is not a document management system — it is a living record of building safety evidence. This article explains what it must contain, who owns it at each stage, and the common failures that emerge at Gateway 3.
Before any compliance obligation can be understood, the HRB determination must be made correctly. This article sets out the statutory definition, how to measure height, the residential unit requirement, exemptions and what an incorrect determination means for a project.
Full end-to-end compliance leadership for a new build in Canary Wharf: six disciplines coordinated, a third-party structural check introduced, and a single submission that secured full BSR approval in six months — a timeline rarely achieved under the new regime.
Industry news, read through the lens of your compliance obligations.
140,000 homes still clad in combustible materials. A 36-week median wait. The BSR has a new plan — and one structural change that could be genuinely transformative. We examine it, citing Charlotte Banks in Construction News.
The BSR's new batching model has cut median decision times to four weeks. But faster processing only helps if your submission is complete. Incomplete applications will be rejected faster, not approved faster.
Nearly nine years after Grenfell, over 140,000 homes still have combustible cladding. The BSR's new remediation improvement plan sets ambitious targets — we examine whether it's enough and what it means in practice.
Barbara Lane, expert witness at the Grenfell Tower Inquiry, has been appointed independent chair of the BAC. We consider what this signals for the direction of building safety regulation.
The BSR has set a target to reduce decision times to under 12 weeks for remediation applications. The regulator is taking responsibility for its end — applicants need to take equal responsibility for theirs.
The Government is consulting on a Single Construction Regulator. Trade bodies are warning against repeating the BSR's resourcing mistakes. We set out what needs to happen differently — and what you should be doing now.
44 higher-risk building schemes were waiting more than three months for a Gateway 3 decision as of January 2026. One case took 550 days. The statutory target is eight weeks. Freedom of Information data is bringing the scale of the backlog into sharp focus.
1,019 applications. A rejection rate of around 50%. Average waits of 30 to 36 weeks. Developers spending up to £25,000 on submissions that fail. After more than a year of full BSR operation, the data reveals an industry still learning how to meet the new standard.
Gateway 2 has become a genuine choke point for high-rise development: average waits of 36 weeks against a statutory target of eight, a high rejection rate, inconsistent guidance and a regulator under-resourced for the volume it is handling. The paradox needs to be understood.
Whether you're at pre-application stage, mid-design or facing a BSR requisition — we can help. We respond within one working day.