Minutes:
The Mayor advised that he had agreed for one item of urgent business to be raised at this meeting that related to Housing Standards. This item had been deemed urgent in light of the time constraints associated with this matter.
At this point, the Mayor invited Cllr T G Pearce to PROPOSE the following motion:
‘This Council will lobby MPs and write to MHCLG to express its concerns about the standards of new housing, calling for:
1. A minimum number of inspections to be carried out on every new dwelling by the Building Control body, local authority or private sector;
2. Quality of work to be incorporated to a higher degree than present, in the Building Regulations;
3. Newly constructed timber framed housing to be included in the Governments Building Safety Programme; and
4. Local Authorities to become the sole provider of Building Control, at least on high risk and all new residential buildings.’
The motion was then SECONDED by Cllr R Cheadle.
In his introduction, the proposer made reference to:-
- there being an increased number of build issues relating to the construction of new dwellings. In addition, this problem was magnified as a result of national building companies frequently employing their own Building Inspectors. As an example, it was often the case that private Building Inspectors would undertake one site inspection and a desktop survey, in comparison to up to six visits that were carried out by officers employed by the Devon Building Control Partnership;
- a version of this motion having already been approved by South Hams and Teignbridge District Councils;
- the competitive nature of the market resulting in price margins being incredibly tight, which was proving to be to the detriment of build standards.
During the ensuing debate, the following points were raised:-
(a) It was noted that this issue was being experienced across the country and a number of local authorities were in the process of approving similar motions and were lobbying central government and their local MPs accordingly;
(b) Some concerns were expressed over part 4 of the motion and an amendment was PROPOSED and SECONDED as follows:
‘That Building Control on high risk and all new residential buildings is to be carried out by properly accredited surveyors independent of the Developers.’
At the invitation of the Mayor, the Deputy Monitoring Officer advised that, since private Inspectors were deemed as being independent of the Developers, then this amendment would simply result in the status quo being retained.
In light of this advice, the proposer and seconder proceeded to withdraw their amendment;
(c) To reassure the wider membership, some Members were of the view that any attempts to improve build quality standards should be supported.
Upon being submitted to the Meeting, it was then declared to be CARRIED and “RESOLVED that:
This Council will lobby MPs and write to MHCLG to express its concerns about the standards of new housing, calling for:
1. A minimum number of inspections to be carried out on every new dwelling by the Building Control body, local authority or private sector;
2. Quality of work to be incorporated to a higher degree than present, in the Building Regulations;
3. Newly constructed timber framed housing to be included in the Governments Building Safety Programme; and
4. Local Authorities to become the sole provider of Building Control, at least on high risk and all new residential buildings.”