Welcome to our CE Midlands October newsletter. I must firstly offer huge appreciation to the team organising the East and West Midlands awards held last month at the Athena in Leicester and Edgbaston Cricket ground and attended by over 500 guests in total. What a huge relief it was to safely get back to some normality and the awards were magnificently received on the night and on social media. Both nights showcased the amazing contribution to best practice construction in our region. We were extremely honoured to have been headline sponsors of both nights.
Following on from the awards we have surveyed our membership about future activities and events to build upon the member benefits of CE Midlands, a forthcoming Board awayday is planned to discuss the responses and plans for the future.
There are so many challenges currently in the construction sector – we have shortages of skilled workforce, professionals and materials and challenging that as we recover from Covid we have proposed regulatory changes under the Fire Safety Bill, continued strengthening of regulations and guidance.
The new BS9991 – fire safety in the design, management and use of residential buildings consultation comes to a close this month and includes a proposal to align residential sprinklers with that of Approved Document B together with changes to smoke ventilation, to name just a few of the strengthening proposals.
All these measures overall fall in line with CE driving to improve the best Practice and better building compliance surety.
Other challenges are the various Planning Authorities now requiring Gateway 1 Fire strategies on developments from low rise upwards. Both of these are matters we at Salus pride ourselves on regarding supporting clients to drive developments forward.
Rather promisingly though is the growing momentum with modular and timber, we are going to have challenges in these sectors on higher rise but for now the lower rise is setting extremely high standards of quality control.
As we move towards the end of this year we at Salus are delighted to celebrate the 20 year milestone and the many celebrations that we will enjoy with our staff and clients
I do hope you enjoy reading the content of this months newsletter with the exciting events and member benefits planned.
Paul Meadows – Director, Salus Building control and Fire safety consultants Ltd
