Almost seven years ago, the Grenfell Tower fire took 72 lives, and in the aftermath, the built environment sector came under the microscope. There were calls for our industry to step up - to take responsibility for fire safety, tighten the focus on competence and for different professions to coordinate with each other. We had to do better.

Since then, a succession of legislative changes has defined responsibilities more clearly. Last August, regulatory legislation published under the Building Safety Act 2022 introduced new duties in England under Building Regulations for the Client, Designer, Principal Designer, Contractor and Principal Contractor. These echoed those terms first introduced under the Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2015.

As with any big changes to long-established ways of working, the transition has naturally caused confusion for some and worry for others. Part of this reaction is because both regimes reference the same dutyholder terms, albeit with two completely separate and distinct sets of duties and regulatory requirements.

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