Has Part P lost what few teeth it had?

[DJM]

I only dip into DIYNOT occasionally just to see what’s happening and obviously when I need advice from the helpful people on all the forums here or I can actually help. But had 5 mins to spare and thought I’d look at the relatively recently revised Part P.

Having read the Approved Documentation P, 2013 which amongst other things reduces the range of electrical installation work that is notifiable and it got me thinking.

It seems to suggest that in summary as long as the change is to a circuit which is existing and not is a special area, then the work is not notifiable. Now accepting that any circuit still needs to be safe and properly planned and tested, and the likely hood is that add some of these could scupper that proviso, that would seem to imply that

• - Exterior lighting and garden power is no longer no longer a notifiable if an extension of an existing circuit
  - Adding as many sockets as you want to an existing Ring final is not notifiable
  - Moving circuits from one CU to another as long as they both exist
  - Re-wiring the kitchen as long as you use the exiting CU connections
  - In fact almost anything outside of fitting a new CU or circuits in bathrooms, swimming pools or saunas

If I am right then why have Part P at all? It was pretty ineffectual before, but at least with notifiable work most normal people got the changes properly (or at least partially) tested. This just seems open season to untested work again. Am I missing the point here?

 

[JohnW2]

Having read the Approved Documentation P, 2013 which amongst other things reduces the range of electrical installation work that is notifiable and it got me thinking. ..... If I am right...

Yes, you're essentially right.

....then why have Part P at all? It was pretty ineffectual before, but at least with notifiable work most normal people got the changes properly (or at least partially) tested. This just seems open season to untested work again. Am I missing the point here?

Good question, but it depends a bit on how one looks at it. Part P (i.e. 'the law') still has exactly the same teeth as it always has had. However, in practice, you are clearly right in saying that the considerable relaxation of what is notifiable means that the routine 'policing' of whether or not Part P is being complied with will inevitably be much reduced.

Part P was introduced, over 8 years ago, on the basis (and with the 'promise') that it would result in a reduction of deaths, injuries and property damage due to faulty electrical installations. Maybe the experience of the last 8 years has failed to show these 'predicted' reductions and has therefore brought into question whether Part P has actually achieved anything, and therefore whether it is 'worth' policing' it?

Kind Regards, John

 

[lxboy]

Yes, its pointless. That's why we do not have it in Scotland. You just go to prison if you bodge it up here.

It does mean we don't add 10 double sockets on a FCU just to get round part P.

We also have a fair amount of cowboys up here!



Lxboy

 

[DJM]

John,
I have just been reading the
Changes to Part P (Electrical safety - Dwellings) of the Building Regulations in England Consultation stage impact assessment

to try and understand what was trying to be achieved, and the assumptions and basis of conclusions were at best hinkey.

Assessing 3 options

• 1 Do nothing
  2 Revoke Part P
  3 Retain Part P with changes

they concluded that

• 1 gave no cost saving and no additional benefits
  2 they had no idea how successful Part P had been in its aim to increase safety so they made some numbers up which were higher than the pre-2005 estimates and concluded that there would be a net cost to economy to revoke Part P
  3 based on the made up numbers in 2, if they reduced costs to the trades by minimising notification then a net gain in monetary terms was achieved

So on some really shocking (sorry had to be done ) analysis which anyone with half a brain could see was flawed, they recommended keeping Part P but making it cheaper to run by removing the only useful part in it.

 

[ericmark]

To me Part P makes it easier to prosecute when something goes wrong. This is what the electricity at work act does with non domestic but before Part P because it was not a work place there were no laws as to what standard is required Part P links the standard to BS7671.

It has not changed for me and I wish it would. But in real terms what do you think Part P or no Part P is that I will go to the LABC and pay them £100 plus vat for a completion certificate when I change my consumer unit?

If the fee was £25 maybe I would pay it but not likely that I will pay the fees levied at the moment. So either it stops as it is or I break the law. OK I already have RCD protection on all circuits but my father-in-law has not and with the extra fee from the LABC the result is he has not changed it.

How this makes things safer I do not know. If any one can explain why an electrical engineer who was clerk of works then project director for Liverpool hospital board for all electrical installations should have to pay a building inspector who has no electrical training to check his work then I will reconsider. However that is just not going to happen.

What I would have liked to have seen was a requirement for all tradesmen working on the domestic market to have some formal qualification to do their work. With like the cherry picker a licence to show he can do that work which does not require a fee of any more than £25 per 5 years to keep updated.

Does not matter if repairing gutters or electrics there needs to be a licence which Joe public knows shows he is able to do the work and has not had over a agreed amount of time had points awarded against him within that said set time.

Unfortunately there is no government scheme. We have ratted tradesmen which from bitter experience means they are useless, and without paying the ratted tradesman company they would get no work. Now as soon as I see ratted tradesmen I avoid them like the plague.

 

[JohnW2]

John, I have just been reading the "Changes to Part P (Electrical safety - Dwellings) of the Building Regulations in England Consultation stage impact assessment"

Yes, we've discussed that document here (and elsewhere) in the past - interesting, isn't it?

So on some really shocking (sorry had to be done ) analysis which anyone with half a brain could see was flawed, they recommended keeping Part P but making it cheaper to run by removing the only useful part in it.

I'm not actually convinced that there ever was a very 'useful part' to it - since the people most likely to undertake sub-standard electrical work have either remained blissfully ignorant about the existance of Part P and notification (because its never been 'publicised') or are the very ones who have simply ignored it! - there has never been any machinery or attempt to 'police' either of those scenarios.

Kind Regards, John.

 

[ericmark]

John, I have just been reading the "Changes to Part P (Electrical safety - Dwellings) of the Building Regulations in England Consultation stage impact assessment"

Yes, we've discussed that document here (and elsewhere) in the past - interesting, isn't it?

So on some really shocking (sorry had to be done ) analysis which anyone with half a brain could see was flawed, they recommended keeping Part P but making it cheaper to run by removing the only useful part in it.

I'm not actually convinced that there ever was a very 'useful part' to it - since the people most likely to undertake sub-standard electrical work have either remained blissfully ignorant about the existance of Part P and notification (because its never been 'publicised') or are the very ones who have simply ignored it! - there has never been any machinery or attempt to 'police' either of those scenarios.

Kind Regards, John.

Unfortunately I have to agree with you. At least now BAS has to find another reason to tell people they can't do what they want.

 

[DJM]

At least now BAS has to find another reason to tell people they can't do what they want.

Surely BAS will just point at BS 7671 now

 

[JohnW2]

Unfortunately I have to agree with you. At least now BAS has to find another reason to tell people they can't do what they want.

I doubt that will cramp his style very much. After all, he can still remind them that they have to comply with Part P (which effectively means complying with BS7671, including all the testing requirements etc.), which hasn't changed even in England!

Kind Regards, John

 

[DJM]

John, I have just been reading the "Changes to Part P (Electrical safety - Dwellings) of the Building Regulations in England Consultation stage impact assessment"

Yes, we've discussed that document here (and elsewhere) in the past - interesting, isn't it?

I'm sure you have and I have been busy at work and car forums for a while so not been actively lurking here so missed it. I really raised it because Iwas so shocked at how bad this change is and the truly poor analysis it is based on.

[I'm not actually convinced that there ever was a very 'useful part' to it - since the people most likely to undertake sub-standard electrical work have either remained blissfully ignorant about the existance of Part P and notification (because its never been 'publicised') or are the very ones who have simply ignored it! - there has never been any machinery or attempt to 'police' either of those scenarios.

Kind Regards, John.

I agree with what you say for the most part, but at least some installations will have had better checking than they would otherwise have had.

 

[DJM]

Re-reading my first post and the new Part P I might have over egged the pudding with the CU move statement.

I guess if a circuit is completely removed from one CU and joined into an existing circuit in another CU in the same building that probably isnt notifiable.

But if if a circuit is completely removed from one cu and then connected to a new MCB or RCBO in another CU in the same building that probably counts as a new circuit and I assume would be notifiable.

 

[JohnW2]

I guess if a circuit is completely removed from one CU and joined into an existing circuit in another CU in the same building that probably isnt notifiable. ... But if if a circuit is completely removed from one cu and then connected to a new MCB or RCBO in another CU in the same building that probably counts as a new circuit and I assume would be notifiable.

Assume nothing Goodness knows what the answer is. Over the last few months, there has been consdierable discussion and debate (here and elsewhere) about what constitutes a 'new circuit' as far as the (now, in England) notification rules are concerned, and I think it would be fair to say that there is no consensus! Furthermore, since these issues never get anywhere near a court, there won't even be any 'Judicial clarification' of interpretation of this bit of the law.

Kind Regards, John

 

[JohnW2]

[I'm not actually convinced that there ever was a very 'useful part' to it - since the people most likely to undertake sub-standard electrical work have either remained blissfully ignorant about the existance of Part P and notification (because its never been 'publicised') or are the very ones who have simply ignored it! - there has never been any machinery or attempt to 'police' either of those scenarios.

I agree with what you say for the most part, but at least some installations will have had better checking than they would otherwise have had.

Yes, that's got to be true - but, as I said, on the whole those 'installations which will have had better checking' will probably not be those that most need 'better checking'. Without 'active policing' of the the law, that's surely inevitable? The tendency will be for the most conscientioulsy and competently undertaken work to be inspected and for the most iffy work not to be inspected!

Kind Regards, John

 

[EFLImpudence]

As I have said before -

I think that more important than which work is no longer notifiable is which people are no longer required to register because of the work they do.

Most importantly kitchen fitters, none of whom now need to be registered
(as has been argued, there are very few new circuits if a kitchen is being refitted).

People more cynical than I may suspect lobbying from the (extremely) large companies.

 

[securespark]

Are we saying there is confusion as to whether a board change is notifiable?