Latest building control approval application data

Decision-making at Building Safety Regulator accelerates as new applications rise

More than 720 decisions were made on applications for building control approval by the Building Safety Regulator (BSR) in the 12 weeks to 22 December 2025, new data has shown⁽¹⁾.

This was up by more than one-quarter (26%) on the 578 decisions made in the 12 weeks ending on 24 November 2025.

Figures published by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), acting as the current BSR, also confirmed that 705 new applications were submitted to the BSR in the same three-month period, bringing the total number of live applications across all work types to 1,166.

This was an 18% rise on the 599 new applications submitted in the 12 weeks to 24 November. The total number of live applications also increased by 33 during the same period.

Of the 1,166 live cases in the BSR’s system as of 22 December, 61% were new applications.

Dr David Crosthwaite, chief economist at BCIS, said: ‘The latest data from the BSR is promising and suggests it’s whittling through its backlog more effectively. With the new Innovation Unit in full swing and managing the lion’s share of new build cases, eliminating legacy applications in the coming weeks seems feasible.

‘However, the BSR faces a growing volume of new applications across the board. Faster decision-making is still needed and acting on lessons learned over the past 24 months will be key to this.’

The latest BSR data show the median time for all decisions made on applications in the three months to 22 December was 19 weeks, up from 18 weeks in the three months to 24 November.

Withdrawn applications aside, decision-making on approved applications took the longest, spanning a median time of 32 weeks. Decisions on rejected applications took a median time of 27 weeks.

Building control approval is a statutory requirement for work on higher-risk buildings (HRBs) to pass the regulatory stop/go point known as gateway 2.

Applications for building control approval are used by the BSR to assess compliance with building regulations, project management due diligence and the competency of project teams⁽²⁾.

Application types

As of 22 December, there were 171 live applications for new build works being processed by the BSR – four more than on 24 November and 19 more than on 1 October.

The majority of new build cases continue to be assessed by the BSR’s new Innovation Unit (IU) with 102 cases under its management at the time of the last recording.

^{Source: Health and Safety Executive – Building control approval application data September to December 2025}

The BSR estimates the rate of new applications under the IU’s responsibility will continue to rise, stabilising somewhere between 120 and 180 cases once a ‘steady state’ is reached, although no time frame has been specified yet.

Elsewhere, 280 live remediation applications were reported as of 22 December. This was down by three applications on 24 November but up on the 253 remediation applications recorded on 22 September according to the BSR’s October dataset.

Decisions made on remediation applications appear to take longer than those made by the IU handling new build cases, as per the latest data.

In the 12 weeks to 22 December, the median time for all decisions made on remediation applications was 34 weeks. By comparison, new build decisions made by the IU took nine weeks.

Approvals were some of the lengthiest decisions made in remediation, taking a median of 43 weeks where new build IU approvals took 12.

A centralised Remediation Unit, adjacent to the IU, is in the works to speed up decision-making on remediation cases.

Between 1Q2024 and 1Q2025, delayed decisions on HRB applications in England rose by 443%. More than half of the BSR caseload in the first quarter of 2025 also comprised outstanding applications from previous quarters.

The latest data arrived ahead of leadership changes to the BSR with the HSE expected to step down from the role in January 2026.

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^{(1) GOV.UK – Building Safety Regulator building control approval application data September to December 2025 – here}

^{(2) GOV.UK – Building control approval for higher-risk buildings – here}