Contents
Call-in of Building Assessment Certificates
Reform of the Building Safety Regulator
Fire Safety Regulations 2025
Fire Safety – Approved Document B
Building Safety (Wales) Bill
The Building Safety Levy
The Renters Rights Act
Electrical Safety in Social Housing
2025 was a considerable year for the building safety landscape.
Following major legislative upheaval from the Building Safety Act 2022 and its associated regulations, 2025 became a year of settling in, with the industry adapting to higher-risk building regimes, compliance processes, and building control oversight becoming more embedded.
Regulatory amendments and newly released legislation continued to shape the landscape. From the Building Safety Regulator reforms to the new residential PEEPs legislation, many 2025 building safety changes will significantly impact the coming year.
Building Safety
Call-in of Building Assessment Certificates by the BSR continues
The Building Safety Regulator will continue to invite Principal Accountable Persons to submit their BAC application. The BSR is working its way through residential buildings under the scope:
- Over 30 metres high with more than 11 residential units
- 18 to 29.99 metres high with more than 378 residential units
- Clad with combustible aluminium composite material
- With large panel systems built between 1957 and 1973 with a gas supply, where it is unclear if reinforcement work has been carried out
Although PAPs have 28 days to submit their Safety Case Report once invited, safety cases should be prepared as soon as reasonably practicable, or as soon as the PAP takes over responsibility.
We predict that the BSR will significantly ramp up requests as it needs to meet its five-year reassessment period.
Reform of the Building Safety Regulator
27th January
The Building Safety Regulator will officially separate from the Health and Safety Executive, giving the BSR its own legal personality. In response to the Grenfell Tower Inquiry’s recommendations, the move is the first step towards establishing a much-needed single construction regulator.
The BSR will move to an independent body under the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG), ending the HSE’s three-year run of the BSR.
The new regulator will keep all the powers, staff, and live cases currently sitting within HSE’s Building Safety Division. The body will be able to prosecute, charge for services, and publish annual reports to Parliament under Freedom of Information rules.
This move aims to improve the Gateway application process for higher-risk buildings, increase transparency, and ensure a single national focus on the safety of residential buildings.
The Fire Safety (Residential Evacuation Plans) (England) Regulations 2025
6th April
Under the new regulation, Responsible Persons (RPs) must prepare Personal Emergency Evacuation Plans (PEEPs) for relevant residents. The regulations aim to improve resident safety and evacuation, specifically for residents who may struggle to evacuate the building on their own.
The scope of the regulation extends to:
- High-rise residential buildings
- Buildings 11–18m with a simultaneous evacuation strategy
As an important step in resident safety, these regulations stem directly from the Grenfell Inquiry recommendations.
Approved document B changes
30th September
The amendments follow significant changes made in 2025, such as new provisions for sprinklers in new care homes, irrespective of height, and the removal of outdated national classes for reaction to fire and roofs, aligning with European standards.
The date marks the end of a transitional period, meaning all new high-rise residential buildings, buildings over 18m, must include two staircases.
Projects that haven’t ‘sufficiently progressed’ by this date must be redesigned to comply.
The amendments also include new building design provisions to support the use of evacuation lifts in apartment blocks.
Building Safety (Wales) Bill
1st July
The Building Safety (Wales) Bill, published last July, set out a new building safety regime for occupied residential buildings in Wales. The Bill similarly aligns with the Building Safety Act 2022 (England) in that accountability and transparency of buildings are key principles. However, the Bill extends beyond the Building Safety Act in that the scope of buildings it applies to is much broader, including residential buildings that are lower in height than 18m.
The Bill is a direct response to the Grenfell Tower tragedy and is widely welcomed across Wales, with its key principles focusing on safety, accountability, and residents’ voices.
First drafted in 2025, the Bill is expected to become law this year, with the new regime in full effect by summer. The Bill has taken time to become law due to the complexity of creating a new regulatory framework, overlapping existing regulations, and addressing concerns about existing buildings.
The Building Safety Levy
1st October
The Building Safety Levy is a new tax that will be charged on new residential buildings across England. It aims to raise £3.4 billion for remediation and building safety purposes. In late 2025, the Levy was postponed to October 2026 to give developers and local authorities more time to prepare for its financial and administrative impact.
The tax will be charged to UK developers. It will be charged by local authorities before the completion of building work and occupation of the building. Any building control applications made after October 2026 will be liable for the Building Safety Levy.
Property Management
The Renters’ Rights Act 2025
While not necessarily building safety-related, this represents the biggest shift in landlord-tenant law in decades. From 1st May, no-fault evictions will be abolished, tenancies will move to open-ended periodic arrangements, rent increases will be limited to once per year, and landlords will be restricted to requesting no more than one month’s rent upfront.
Landlords will also be prohibited from accepting rent above the advertised price, will be unable to refuse pets without reasonable grounds, and will be subject to new civil penalties.
In January 2026, the government plans to publish draft secondary legislation setting out the information that must be provided to tenants.
A new Private Landlord Ombudsman scheme is also expected to launch in October 2026.
Electrical Safety in Social Housing
May
As part of wider efforts to improve standards in rented homes, the original 2020 regulations were amended in 2025 to extend electrical safety requirements to the social rented sector: Electrical Safety Standards in the Private Rented Sector (England) (Amendment) (Extension to the Social Rented Sector) Regulations 2025.
From this date, social landlords must ensure electrical installations are inspected at least every five years in existing tenancies. The regulation for new tenancies took effect back in December 2025.
All checks must be completed no later than November 2026, and landlords must obtain a report from a qualified person, provide copies of the report to residents, and to the local authority if requested.
Last Updated: 20th January 2026