Clearview South January 2014 - Issue 146 | Page 48

ENERGYEFFICIENCY

CALL TO KEEP CODE FOR
SUSTAINABLE HOMES SLAMMED
The Federation of Master Builders (FMB)
has slammed the House of Commons
Environmental Audit Committee’s report
into the Code for Sustainable Homes and
the Housing Standards Review as “onesided” and called on the Committee to
re-examine the evidence.
The Committee’s report calls on the
Department for Communities and Local
Government (DCLG) to reconsider plans
outlined in the recent Housing Standards
Review consultation to phase out the Code for
Sustainable Homes and questioned its plans to

rationalise technical standards through a set of
tiered national standards.
Brian Berry, FMB Chief Executive, said:
“For years, the building industry has had
to negotiate a proliferation of competing,
overlapping and sometimes contrary local
and national standards. These have added
unnecessary complexity and cost to the
house building industry, and have had a
disproportionate impact on smaller firms and
smaller developments.”
Berry concluded: “The Code for Sustainable
Homes may have served a useful purpose in

setting and driving standards for sustainable
building, but as the Standards Review
recognised, the Government’s policy on zero
carbon homes has now outstripped any need
for the Code. It must be recognised that
current energy efficiency standards required
under Part L of the Building Regulations, and
the proposed uplift in standards due to be
implemented in 2014, are already extremely
ambitious and highly challenging for the
industry. The idea that local authorities would
be looking to set higher standards still is
baff