Building standard 3.3 - flooding and groundwater guidance review: research

1

Apologies for the delay in responding, I had passed around our team and had given officers a couple of weeks to respond.

The comments I have received are as follows:-

• It looks like an awful lot of work to negate a problem that has never arisen in the area? We tend to consult with the Contaminated Land Officer and Planning to assess the required measures already.
• Furthermore, it would be of great benefit if the acronym PFR was explained at the start and not in the last 3rd of the document.
• Bit of doubling up with what the Planning department would deal with initially.

2

Please see some feedback as requested:

• As noted in Approved Document C, “Flood resistance is not currently a requirement in Schedule 1 of the [English] Building Regulations.” Which may explain why recommendations in C790B are somewhat watered-down and/or contain that many caveats and references to client wishes, preferences, cost effectiveness, etc.
• Anyway, we are not convinced CIRIA C790B is the most appropriate publication to refer to in guidance to Standard 3.3, which after all is one of the functional standards identified in Schedule 5 of Building (Scotland) Regulations 2004. Not to put too fine a point on it, but functional Standard 3.3 has the full force of an SSI behind it, whereas C790B contains a series of optional measures to help reduce the extent of damage caused by flooding, should the building owner wish to adopt any of them.
• I would suggest guidance to Standard 3.3 could do with being a bit more prescriptive, anyway. Otherwise, local authority verifiers throughout Scotland might end up adopting wildly differing interpretations of the requirements of Standard 3.3, or just give up on trying to enforce it altogether.

3

No response received.

4

No response received.

5

Apologies for the delayed reply and last minute response.

Had a quick look through the Practice Checklist and agree with the draft at this stage. No additional comments from me. Definitely long overdue to have some form guidance/checklist.

6

…Building Standards have no comments to make on the suggested Flood Risk Good Practice Draft

7

I’ve not got any comments on your checklist, it seems appropriate and think you have covered it well.

…. the Flood Team doesn’t get involved at the Building Control stage, our involvement is at the pre-planning or planning stage where we are an internal advisor to Planning, and we will look for applicants to include details of flood risk and potential mitigation measures (where appropriate). The Flood Management Team will assess planning applications for flood risk and we have our own guidance for developers on the requirements.

This is a different part of the process to Building Standards, and you already have it covered in the second point of the checklist. I just wanted to highlight this in case you want to make reference to it as well.

8

…. we have the following comments to make,

All references to Planning Department should not be part of the Building Standards Technical Handbook.

Planning Should have decided if the site is suitable for development (free of flood risk) before the point of submission of Building Warrant. Building Standards should be made responsible for consultation regarding flooding. It is too late at that point.

Noting stating requirement for PFR to be signed off by a flood officer or structural engineer at Warrant Stage- does this mean we will not be able to progress the warrant application due to this? Who pays for the cost of any consultation? Why is this not done at Planning Stage?

Building Standards do not check planning conditions why is this being added in to our duties?

Evidence of in-situ and wet testing.

• Receive post installation audit (PiA).
• Receive Homeowner Flood Plan (or O&M manuals) This should not be part of the CCNP,

Stages 1-3 should be dealt with by Planning/at planning stage and not Building standards.

LABSS

If this is specifically for Building Standards, it should refer to verification as opposed to checking and should include to this being part of the building warrant assessment process and as part of reasonable inquiry checks on site.

The common terminology in this respect would be 'Building Standards Surveyors' or 'verifiers'.

Perhaps covered elsewhere, does this reference a Local Authority person, if so may be worthwhile clarifying.

Agreed that early consideration is key. Again not sure if covered elsewhere but it is also key that the applicant/owner/architect, considers such matters well before the building warrant application stage.

Recognised where, in the Technical Handbooks? I think this will be covered in the current BSD review.

As referenced before, suggest use 'surveyor' or 'verifier'.

I'm not sure about this sentence. We must ensure building standards surveyors are trained appropriately and I'm happy to discuss this further with the BSD as part of the Hub's role. I don't think the knowledge required is so specialist that it would need an expert to review. Also worth noting that in legislation 'compliance' is the responsibility of the relevant person.

May be covered elsewhere, but there could be reference to pre- application discussion with the verifier.

Is there any element of the report which references the duty of the applicant/agent etc to check flooding implications way before the formal building warrant application process. It shouldn't be the case that the first point the agent becomes aware of flooding issues is the building warrant or indeed planning application process.

Just need to watch the language in the context of planning and building standards being separate processes with different requirements in terms of compliance with guidance. I would say that in most cases discussion between the building standards verifier and relevant LA flooding section would be beneficial.

Again, these documents should also be included within any checklist for applicants and agents.

Need to consider context. There is no formal 'sign off' process in this regard, other than by the verifier through the approval of the building warrant. Other discussions would be in the context of consultation.

Just need to make sure these standards are referenced within the Technical Handbooks.

Not sure if the context of inspection is covered elsewhere in terms of the verifier undertaking reasonable inquiry, this being risk based checks based on the particulars of each warrant application. You could reference including such areas within the CCNP.

Suggest remove, the verifier would not specifically check compliance with planning conditions. If there were any issues on site they would refer these to planning colleagues for investigation from their perspective.

Terminology. Should be 'Submission of Completion Certificate by relevant person' or similar.

As noted above.

May need explained if not covered elsewhere. I would suggest wet testing would be for the relevant person to undertake as opposed to the verifier.

Not sure the verifier would need this, should be included within any home owners pack if a new dwelling.

Just need to consider the purpose of this paper in the context of previous comments. For example stage 1 and 2 should be undertaken prior to any building warrant application submission.