The Construction Industry Council (CIC) has published its response to the call for evidence on the Single Construction Regulator’s new strategy, calling for closer collaboration to improve safety across the built environment
The CIC says effective regulation will require government and the construction industry to work together, with greater collaboration needed to support a safer built environment.
The call for evidence on the Single Construction Regulator’s strategy opened in May 2026, following publication of the regulator’s prospectus in December 2025. The consultation closed in August.
The CIC’s response included the following observations:
- To support reform of the sector Government must ensure that there is an incentive for professionals to put themselves under rules of ethics, professional conduct and continuing professional development. In many disciplines there are a significant number of individuals working in the sector outside any relevant professional institution or discipline. CIC has set out a plan of actions needed to strengthen professional standards, reinforce public trust, and raise standards of governance and professional competence in the built environment sector. CIC members have done and continue to do a huge amount around improving competence and are keen to work with government to deliver the reforms that the sector needs.
- Regulation and oversight must be proportionate and co-designed with industry in order to be robust. Government itself has a huge role to play in both working with the professional bodies and bringing about broader behavioural change through procurement, prompt payment, enforcement of existing rules and engaging in a practical way beyond the role of legislator and regulator. As the built environment sector’s biggest client and with a pipeline of hundreds of billions of pounds of work over the next decade there is plenty that can be done within the current system that would make a transformational change.
- Our building stock will be used by future generations and needs to play its part in order to provide a robust defence against overheating, flooding, wildfires and other climate-linked events. This will lead to a wider discussion over what is considered ‘safety critical’. A strategy focused narrowly on fire and structural engineering and building-control professionals will miss the gaps that most affect flood risk, overheating and the success of energy saving measures, including retrofit. Addressing this within government’s vision will help protect consumers and the UK’s safety and national security in addition to reducing pressure on public services.
- CIC re-emphasised the call it made in the Single Construction Regulator prospectus consultation for government to work with industry on the opportunities and challenges of AI and data interoperability and to help break down the barriers to collaboration including poor legacy data, cost, poor cybersecurity, limited digital skills and insufficient clarity over data ownership.
CIC chief executive, Graham Watts OBE, said: “The professional institutions have done and continue to make improvements in their competence requirements for members, both in terms of their initial qualification and their ongoing development but there are many people working in professional occupations that deliberately remain outside of the formal professional body network.
“Whatever the government chooses to do in relation to professional regulation it must ensure that standards are raised across the sector and not just for those who already submit themselves to the requirements of the professional institutions. Government must build on the change that has already been made.”
Other bodies say culture needs to be primary concern
In July, the Industry Safety Steering Group (ISSG) released a state-of-the-industry assessment and found that the industry is not adapting to the government’s changes in terms of safety, meaning the culture of safety is changing too slowly.
One of the reasons given for this is that many construction businesses are treating the Building Safety Act and other updates as ‘optional’ and not adopting them fully or at all.
The ISSG therefore says there needs to be stronger crackdowns to ensure firms are adopting these changes and taking safety more seriously.
The forward look of the report reads: “ISSG continues to pay close attention to incidents around the world related to building safety. While Grenfell was a devastating and defining tragedy, it was not an isolated event.
“Other serious incidents continue to occur, serving as sobering reminders of the risks inherent in the built environment, particularly during refurbishment and remediation works on occupied buildings.
“The tragedy in Hong Kong in November 2025, much like the Dagenham fire in August 2024, underscore the dangers that can arise when such work is undertaken without adequate controls and oversight.”
