Chris Bielby MBE, chair of the Electrical Safety Roundtable, has looked at the progress being made on monitoring and enforcing Part P of the Building Regulations, and asks what more could be done.
When the Office of the deputy prime minister introduced Part P of the Building Regulations back in 2005, it was amid concerns that the risks posed by unsafe electrical installations were increasing. The past fourteen years have seen huge changes to the landscape of the electrical industry, with Competent Person Scheme Operators helping to maintain high standards by regularly assessing their members onsite to ensure continued competence. However, while the introduction of Part P has helped to raise standards in general, more must be done to punish those who continue to carry out non-compliant, potentially dangerous electrical work. It is this fight which I have been heavily involved in over the past few years.
He agreed to become chair of the Electrical Safety Roundtable (ESR) at its inception in 2012 because he was concernedPart P of the Building Regulations hadn’t been quite the success it should have been. Consumers seemed generally unaware of the value of using competent registered electricians and the severity of the dangers that could arise from poor-quality installations.
In addition, the electrical safety information available on the majority of consumer facing websites was inconsistent at best, and confusing at worst. Research done by the ESR also found that Local Authorities (LAs) were not actively enforcing these regulations as stringently as they could. A Freedom of Information request sent to all LAs in England found that almost three-quarters of authorities had taken no action against Part P non-compliance between 2011 and 2013. Worryingly, this does not seem to be because Part P non-compliance is not being seen: nine LAs had identified breaches of Part P but taken no action, and only one successful prosecution was brought against an individual carrying out substandard electrical work by an authority during the survey period. While the vast majority of electricians do comply with the regulations, it is clear that deterrents are needed to convince the rogue minority to fall into line – or find a more suitable career.