Essential safety compliance checks — Maintaining public building assets is serious business

LG Leader December 2019

During 2019, there have been many news stories concerning deaths, injuries, losses and damage arising from unsafe buildings, including from faulty machinery, broken freezer doors and unsafe cladding.  These events have caused many councils to review their asset registers for compliance with safety requirements, including but not limited to, compliance with certificates of occupancy and annual essential safety provision returns under the Development Act 1993.

Specifically, section 67 of the Development Act 1993 requires the owners of Class 1b – 9 buildings (under the National Construction Code) to ensure that their buildings are occupied in strict accordance with a valid certificate of occupancy. Regulation 76 of the Development Regulations 2008 provides that, to obtain a certificate of occupancy, a building owner must have the essential safety provisions of the building (which include sprinklers, alarms and other measures) tested and must provide proof of testing to the relevant authority.  Where a building is a Class 2 building or over 3 storeys in height or is larger than 2,000 square metres, or where a building is a Class 3-8 or 9b building over 2 storeys in height or is larger than 500 square metres, essential safety provisions must be tested annually and proof of such testing must be returned to the local council.

In circumstances where regulation 76 is not complied with, a certificate of occupancy may not be issued, or may be cancelled.

The purpose of these requirements is to ensure that all essential safety provisions are fully installed, operative and (where relevant) are tested on an annual basis.

Many councils have undertaken audits of their essential safety provisions and have discovered significant non-compliance from private land-owners, and also from council-owned buildings. We are able to assist with certificates of occupancy and essential safety provision audits and advice if and when needed.

The provisions in the Planning, Development and Infrastructure Act 2016, when in force in 2020, will also require certificates of occupancy for Class 1a buildings. In that context, and with the media attention being given to these issues, now is the time to review your council’s records of certificates of occupancy and essential safety provisions and, if necessary, to develop an action plan to ensure compliance with statutory requirements. This is especially important if records for council-owned buildings are not up-to-date.

If you would like any further information please contact us.