It is common knowledge that there are weaknesses within particular building sectors in the construction industry. Homeowners have coped with considerable losses in terms of the equity of their apartments due to structural faults in the buildings. It was not too long ago that cases such as the Opal Tower in Olympic Park Sydney were in the news, where residents were evacuated from their homes as the buildings were declared unsafe.
NSW Building Commissioner & NSW Fair Trading step in
To avoid similar debacles, the Office of the NSW Building Commissioner has introduced a Design and Building Practitioners Regulation from 1 July 2021, which mandates building design practitioners to submit 'Design Compliance Documentation' to the NSW Planning Portal. This submission needs to be done before any construction work is commenced. The change in practice is currently related to Class 2* buildings, which mainly comprise residential buildings with Sole Occupancy Units (SOU). The Design & Building Practitioners Act is planned to be expanded to incorporate Class 3 (hotels and accommodation facilities) and Class 9C (aged care) buildings.
The purpose of the change
The change promises to restore apartment owners' confidence, ensuring complete data is captured by the design and building practitioners. This extends to professional engineers who work on Class 2 buildings or buildings with a Class 2 part in any of the following areas – civil, electrical, geotechnical, mechanical, structural and fire safety. According to this new obligation, the recorded documentation submission must include nominated products. That means products cannot be listed just as the category; for instance, 'rigid insulation board' needs to be branded as 'Kingspan Kooltherm K10 G2 Soffit Board'. This kind of detail assists in tracing the products used in particular buildings and helps investigate if the building is subject to any defects. Previously, the nomination of product documents was not compulsory, making it very easy to change building products at any construction stage. Not having to brand the products often resulted in the products being switched to a non-compliant alternative.
Moreover, according to the new regulation, only registered design practitioners can submit project documents on the portal. Furthermore, they need to follow up with a signed-off declaration about their submission of individual projects. These practitioners also require adequate indemnity insurance to make such a declaration; therefore, a lot is at stake for them.
Apart from the initial submission, if any changes are made in the design or material used, those changes need to be signed off, recorded and submitted to the NSW Planning Portal again. In this process, the practitioners become aware of any non-compliant products, which may be proposed for use in the project.
The practice of regulated designs and compliance declarations to be lodged on the NSW Planning Portal has stemmed from assessing malpractices in the industry around Class 2 buildings and is monitored by NSW Fair Trading. The aim is to have compliant products prevalent in the building construction industry and to make sure that the end user doesn’t have to suffer the consequences of the use of non-compliant products.
What does the future look like?
It is currently proposed that the above change spills over Class 2 buildings into other residential use buildings, with a possibility of being adapted in other states of the country too.
As a result of this introduction and change in documenting projects, apartment owners will sleep better now with peace of mind that they are now protected under the NSW Fair Trading.
*Class 2 are typically multi-unit residential buildings where people live above and below each other (SOU).
