Where are we today?

It is June 2026, and just over nine years have elapsed since the Grenfell fire disaster. A horrific event that turned Building Safety on its head and demanded dramatic reforms.

This instigated not only the inquiry into how the event could have happened, (now concluded), but the development of a new core framework now in force in England.

THE BUILDING SAFETY ACT 2022

The reforms proposed in the Act are now substantially in place and functioning:

The Building Safety Regulator (BSR) is fully operational and oversees higher-risk buildings (HRBs).
Higher-risk residential buildings (generally 18m+/7 storeys+) must be registered and managed under the new safety regime, including safety case reports and accountable-person duties.
The golden thread requirements and duty holder regime are now established parts of the regulatory process.
The BSR continues to process gateway approvals and building-control applications, although industry bodies still report concerns about approval timelines and capacity.

PROGRESS, YES, BUT IS IT ENOUGH?

This is all well and good, and commendable too. However, while the legal framework is robust, its practical application has suffered from huge administrative and structural bottlenecks. Where things have particularly stalled centres around cladding matters.

Three statutory ‘gateways’ were introduced, to form the foundations of a more accountable and transparent building safety regime:

Gateway 1: At the planning stage.

Gateway 2: Before building work starts (pre-construction approval).

Gateway 3: When building work is completed.

However, following their introduction, the Building Safety Regulator was quickly overwhelmed by a massive backlog of Gateway 2 applications. By the first quarter of 2025, the system had become so severely congested that Gateway 2 approvals were taking an average of 36 weeks – three times the statutory 12-week target. During January to March 2025, the BSR processed only 257 applications, while around 1,276 applications were still pending in the system. The resulting backlog was seriously delaying both new high-rise housing developments and vital remediation projects.

ACCELERATING CHANGE

Clearly, the wait times were not acceptable, leaving many occupants of high-rise buildings in potentially unsafe living conditions.

On 30 June 2025, Lord Andy Roe KFSM – former Commissioner of London Fire Brigade – was appointed as non-executive Chair of a newly formed shadow board under the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG), as part of a sweeping government overhaul to tackle the delays. The shadow board marked the first step in transitioning the BSR from the Health and Safety Executive to MHCLG as a standalone executive agency.

Under revised leadership, the BSR introduced measures intended to clear the massive backlog of Gateway applications.

New build applications: success
By October 2025, the backlog of legacy new-build Gateway 2 applications had reduced from 134 to 102, while the newly established Innovation Unit was consistently meeting the 12-week service standard for new applications.

Remediation applications: failure
However, remediation applications continued to progress much more slowly, with approval times still around 30 weeks – leaving approximately 25,000 homes with live remediation cases.

“There are far too many residential buildings today still with unsafe cladding and the speed with which this is being addressed is far too slow. Affected residents face distress and higher bills while they wait for action.”

Clearly, the new Gateway is working for new build applications but still failing remediation cases.

WHY IS CLADDING REMEDIATION SO SLOW?

One key factor is that the BSR has struggled with incomplete or error-ridden safety case applications from building owners, keeping the volume of open remediation cases uncomfortably high.

Tim Cullis is a leaseholder advocate and director of a Resident Management Company who has been actively tracking how the new regulations impact high-risk buildings managed by residents. As a director of one such building, the Warwick Drive (Barnes) Management Company Limited, he has used Freedom of Information requests to proactively engage with the Health and Safety Executive and the Building Safety Regulator.

He focused his efforts on monitoring:

How many of England’s ~12,000 high-risk residential buildings are managed by Resident Management Companies (RMCs) or Right-to-Manage (RTM) groups.
The rate at which the Building Safety Regulator is instructing these resident-led companies to submit their mandatory Building Assessment Certificate (BAC) applications.

Tim identified that under the Building Safety Act, RMCs and RTMs often fall under the category of the Principal Accountable Person (PAP) or Accountable Person (AP). The process requires the Principal Accountable Person to demonstrate that building safety risks are being properly identified, managed and controlled.

“This places a massive, complex legal burden on ordinary leaseholders to compile building safety cases and apply for certificates.”

As a result, leaseholders who serve as directors are left grappling with the sheer technical complexity of compiling “safety cases.”

On a more positive note, it is important to recognise that the Building Safety Act fundamentally altered the allocation of remediation costs. In many circumstances, qualifying leaseholders are now protected from the historic costs of fixing life-critical defects, with liability shifted towards developers, freeholders and associated entities.

REMEDIATION ACCELERATION PLAN UPDATE

The Remediation Acceleration Plan (RAP) was first published in December 2024 and updated in July 2025 . The RAP established policy objectives and enforcement proposals, but many of its most significant measures require further primary legislation through a proposed Remediation Bill, including:

Stronger enforcement against owners and developers who fail to remediate.
A dedicated remediation enforcement function within the Building Safety Regulator.
New proposals for a statutory duty to remediate unsafe buildings.
Potential criminal penalties and severe sanctions for parties that obstruct or fail to progress remediation.

The Government has set targets that by the end of 2029, all 18m+ residential buildings with unsafe cladding within government remediation programmes should be completed; and all 11m+ residential buildings with unsafe cladding should either have been remediated, have a completion date, or be subject to formal enforcement action. Ambitious, perhaps, in light of recent history.

TIME PERMITTING?

The wheel turns slowly. Steps are being taken, yet as of June 2026, the Government’s position remains that the Remediation Bill will be introduced “as soon as parliamentary time allows”, but no commencement date has yet been fixed.

CONCLUSION

The Building Safety Act 2022 has undoubtedly transformed the regulatory landscape, as it set out to do. The framework envisaged in the wake of Grenfell is now largely in place, with clearer accountability, stronger oversight and a far greater emphasis on resident safety than existed previously.

Yet legislation alone does not in itself make buildings safer. Nearly nine years after Grenfell, thousands of residents continue to live in buildings awaiting remediation, while developers, managing agents, resident-led companies and regulators wrestle with a system that remains administratively demanding and resource intensive.

The challenge facing Government is therefore no longer one of policy design but of delivery. The success of the Building Safety Act will ultimately be judged not by the number of regulations enacted, but by the number of unsafe buildings remediated and residents protected.

Until remediation is completed at scale, the England’s building safety remains a work in progress.

MIH – ON THE CASE

MIH, through association with Tim Cullis and the efforts he has made to address the very difficult safety-case application process, has met with both Tim and Andy Roe. This has given MIH particular insight into the problems faced, allowing us to more deeply understand and help to solve these issues.

If you are facing similar issues we are in a position to support you, so please do get in touch.