Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what progress his Department has made on clearing the backlog caused by the Building Safety Regulator since 30 June 2025.

We recognise that delays to the assessment of applications have been unacceptable, which is why we announced reforms to the Building Safety Regulator (BSR) on 30 June, including plans to establish the BSR as a separate body.

The BSR is already making operational and policy changes to speed up decision making, particularly on building control approval, including through the introduction of an Innovation Unit. Early signs are positive with all applications in the Innovation Unit so far on track to exceed or meet the 12-week SLA as they progress through the application process.

To support transparency and accountability, the BSR published performance data on 16 October and will continue to do so monthly to track progress against this commitment.

Gateway 2 decisions in July-September 2025 doubled to over 500 compared to around 250 in January-March 2025. In addition, the backlog of new-build applications has reduced from 134 on 30^th June 2025 to 102 on 15^th October 2025.

The BSR has provided the sum of residential units that were without a decision covering these timeframes as of the 1^st of each month spanning over 6 months: