Which edi­tion of Build­ing Code of Aus­tralia applies to devel­op­ments in NSW?

The Build­ing Code of Aus­tralia (BCA) is part of the the Nation­al Con­struc­tion Code (NCC). 

The NCC is updat­ed every 3 years, based on required reg­u­la­to­ry prac­tices, indus­try research, pub­lic feed­back and pol­i­cy direc­tions from gov­ern­ments between pub­lish­ing cycles.

Con­struc­tion projects often span 2 ver­sions of the BCA.

There has his­tor­i­cal­ly been much debate in the New South Wales con­struc­tion indus­try on the ques­tion of which year/​version of the Build­ing Code of Aus­tralia applies.

Cer­tain­ty was pro­vid­ed in the ​‘lock in’ pro­vi­sions of clause 19 the Envi­ron­men­tal Plan­ning and Assess­ment (Devel­op­ment Cer­ti­fi­ca­tion and Fire Safe­ty) Amend­ment (Con­struc­tion Cer­tifi­cates) Reg­u­la­tion 2023 (the Reg­u­la­tion) which com­menced on 3 Feb­ru­ary 2023.

Clause 19 pro­vides that where there is a sin­gle con­struc­tion cer­tifi­cate for a project, the applic­a­ble ver­sion or ​‘edi­tion’ of the BCA is that ver­sion in force on the day on which the appli­ca­tion for the con­struc­tion cer­tifi­cate was made.

Clause 19 also ​‘locks in’ the applic­a­ble ver­sion or ​‘edi­tion’ of the Build­ing Code of Aus­tralia for new mul­ti­ple storey buildings:

• For mul­ti-storey build­ings sub­ject to mul­ti­ple con­struc­tion cer­tifi­cates, the edi­tion of the BCA apply­ing to con­struc­tion cer­tifi­cate appli­ca­tions issued after the con­struc­tion cer­tifi­cate for the ​‘entrance floor’ has been issued (‘lat­er in time con­struc­tion cer­tifi­cate appli­ca­tions’) is the edi­tion that applied to the con­struc­tion cer­tifi­cate appli­ca­tion which includes the build­ing work involv­ing the ​‘entrance floor’.

The Reg­u­la­tion defines ​‘entrance floor, of a mul­ti storey build­ing, to ​‘mean the floor of the build­ing con­tain­ing the prin­ci­pal pedes­tri­an entrance’.

• For devel­op­ments that are sub­ject to mod­i­fied con­struc­tion cer­tifi­cates, the edi­tion of the BCA apply­ing to all appli­ca­tions to mod­i­fy devel­op­ment is that BCA edi­tion which applied to the ​‘orig­i­nal’ con­struc­tion cer­tifi­cate appli­ca­tion that is the sub­ject of the modification.

The cer­ti­fi­er is required to nom­i­nate the applic­a­ble BCA edi­tion on the con­struc­tion cer­tifi­cate that applies to the build­ing work.

Con­struc­tion con­tract draft­ing allo­cat­ing the risk of chang­ing ver­sions of the BCA across staged projects 

Gen­er­al­ly, it is the ​‘change on law’ pro­vi­sion of a con­struc­tion con­tract which deals with the cir­cum­stance of a change in the applic­a­ble ver­sion of the BCA.

Con­struc­tion con­tracts will usu­al­ly require the con­trac­tor to:

• car­ry out and com­plete the works in accor­dance with the ​‘Law’ or ​‘Leg­isla­tive Require­ments’; and
• to ensure that the works, when com­plet­ed, meet the require­ments of the ​‘Law’ or ​‘Leg­isla­tive Requirements’. 

‘Law’ or ​‘Leg­isla­tive Require­ment’ is usu­al­ly express­ly defined to include the BCA. For example:

Leg­isla­tive requirement

includes:

1. …
2. the Nation­al Con­struc­tion Code (incor­po­rat­ing the Build­ing Code of Aus­tralia) and all oth­er applic­a­ble Aus­tralian Stan­dards, indus­try stan­dards, codes, guide­lines and poli­cies; and
3. …

Who bears the time and cost risk of a change on law will often be pro­vid­ed for in the terms of the con­struc­tion contract.

The una­mend­ed Aus­tralian Stan­dards suite of con­tracts pro­vides for an adjust­ment to the con­tract sum where a change in law occurs which neces­si­tates a change to the works or the contractor’s meth­ods of working. 

How­ev­er, in a staged project, for exam­ple in cir­cum­stances where the intro­duc­tion of new ver­sion of the BCA is expect­ed, the change in law pro­vi­sion may pro­vide that relief is only avail­able where the change in law comes into effect after the date of the con­tract and where the change could not have been rea­son­ably antic­i­pat­ed by a com­pe­tent contractor. 

Where a pub­lic com­ment draft (PCD) of the pro­posed NCC has been released (as is the case in rela­tion to NCC 2025), a con­tract sum and exten­sion of time adjust­ment may not be avail­able to the con­trac­tor on the basis that the PCD was in cir­cu­la­tion and the con­trac­tor should have priced and pro­grammed for the change in law on ​‘day 1’.

Alter­na­tive­ly, in times of increased reg­u­la­to­ry reform, as is the case cur­rent­ly in New South Wales with the pend­ing intro­duc­tion of the Build­ing Bill, a con­trac­tor may be unwill­ing to take any time and cost risk aris­ing from a change in law that comes into effect after the date of the contractor’s ten­der and accord­ing­ly the con­struc­tion con­tract will allo­cate this risk to the developer/​principal by enti­tling the con­trac­tor to both time (includ­ing poten­tial­ly delay dam­ages) and cost relief aris­ing from such a change in the law.

Some con­struc­tion con­tracts may spec­i­fy which par­ty bears the time and costs risk for changes in express­ly iden­ti­fied laws sub­ject to immi­nent or expect­ed change.

Par­ties need to con­sid­er care­ful­ly the allo­ca­tion of the risk aris­ing from a change in law.

If your project is like­ly to be affect­ed by a change in the applic­a­ble ver­sion of the BCA or any oth­er law, Swaab’s team of expe­ri­enced build­ing and con­struc­tion lawyers can help.