SAEMA – Specialist Access Engineering and Maintenance Association – has a long history in delivering the best training and guidance in the temporary and permanent suspended access industry.
In keeping with our commitment to advancing safety through raising the standards in best practice, we keep in touch with all the latest developments – chiefly safety, worker welfare and the environment. We are pleased to share the following story that the Construction Leadership Council (CLC) has welcomed the recently published joint Chartered Institute of Building (CIOB) and the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) free guide to managing Safety-Critical Elements (SCEs) in building construction, for their members and the wider built environment sector.
The Guide to Managing Safety-Critical Elements in Building Construction helps to identify high-risk elements in and around buildings. It outlines systems that should be adopted to ensure that SCEs are properly incorporated and will serve as an important tool to ensure good practice and deliver safe, high-quality buildings.
The guide recognises the cross-industry need for a rigorous and structured approach to the design, construction and inspection of safety-critical building elements. It highlights elements that, if omitted or installed incorrectly, can pose significant risk to people in and around buildings, including:
- Safe means of escape for occupants and access for firefighters
- Combustibility of cladding and insulating materials
- Effective fire compartmentation including smoke control, firestopping, cavity-barriers and fire doors
- Structural integrity of masonry cladding panels and the proper incorporation of necessary brick accessories into them including fixings, bed-joint reinforcement, wind posts and ties
- Structural integrity of balconies
The guide can be found here.
Building safety is one of the CLC’s key priorities and recognises the requirement for whole industry collaboration, ownership and action in core building safety principles and tangible culture change.
Karl Whiteman, Divisional Managing Director, Berkeley Group and CLC Industry Sponsor for Building Safety said:
“The design and construction of buildings is rightly in the spotlight, making the publication of this guide very timely indeed. It will help the industry as it continues to evolve how it designs, constructs and independently verifies new buildings. Building safety has to be the industry’s number one priority and we appreciate the attention the government is currently giving to this issue.”
Former President of the Royal Society of Ulster Architects (RSUA) and current member of RIBA’s Expert Advisory Group on Fire Safety Professor John Cole CBE said:
“This guide is a spur to the industry. We have seen much evidence showing how poorly Safety-Critical Elements have been installed in too many buildings. We all have to stand up, be serious and take appropriate responsibility. We want to push the industry to ensure that, on every project, all SCEs that could potentially impact the safety of future building users are properly designed, installed and inspected, with supporting evidence of compliance.”
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