The future of proposed changes to Australia’s building code remains uncertain and is unlikely to be known until after the federal election.

And the longer-term future of code updates remains uncertain amid Coalition pledges to freeze any changes for a decade if it wins office.

As the federal election looms, the Australian Building Codes Board (ABCB) has confirmed that the process of issuing the 2025 update of the National Construction Code (NCC 2025) has been delayed.

In a statement published on its web site, the ABCB confirmed that the usual process for NCC updates would not be followed in relation to NCC 2025.

Under the regular three-year updating cycle to the NCC, the ABCB issues a preview of the Code in February before the Code comes into effect in May.

In its statement, however, the ABCB indicated that this would not be happening in relation to NCC 2025.

Furthermore, the Board indicated that it is yet to provide its final advice to state and national building ministers in regard to the content, publication or commencement of the 2025 update to the Code.

For these reasons, both the fate of the proposed changes and the timing of their introduction remains uncertain.

“We have recently received a number of questions from industry and community members about when the next edition of the NCC will be published,” the ABCB said it its statement.

“In past cycles, we have published a ‘Preview’ version of the NCC in February and a final version for commencement in May. We will not be following that pattern in 2025.

“While some practitioners are familiar with the changes we proposed in the Public Comment Draft (May 2024), we have not yet provided our final advice to Building Ministers and, therefore, no decision has been made about the content, publication or commencement of any future edition.

“Practitioners should continue working in accordance with the NCC version, and adoption timeline, currently in place in the jurisdiction relevant to their work.

“We will provide another update when more information is available.”

In a response to questions from Sourceable, the ABCB did not expand on either the reasons for the delay or the anticipated timeline for the new Code.

As a matter of background, the ABCB pointed Sourceable to its decision making and consultation processes as well as its published work program.

Political uncertainty

The latest announcement comes amid uncertainty about the future of updates to Australia’s building code, the formal name for which is the National Construction Code (NCC).

The NCC is Australia’s primary set of technical provisions for the design, construction, and performance of buildings and plumbing/drainage systems.

The Code sets out the minimum requirements regarding building safety, health, amenity, accessibility, and sustainability that new buildings are expected to meet (along with new building work in existing buildings) throughout the nation.

As things stand, the Code is updated every three years – with the last update having taken place in 2022.

Under recent times, however, the compliance burden associated with Code updates has been the subject of debate.

This followed a massive update in NCC 2022 that included a significant tightening of energy efficiency requirements and the introduction of accessible housing standards into the Code for the first time. As a result of those changes, as well as current industry pressures, adoption of some of the changes was delayed across most states and territories.

In response to all this, the South Australian government has paused the adoption of NCC updates in its state for ten years.

Meanwhile, the  Coalition has vowed to freeze all updates to the Code for a decade if it wins office.

Basics of the proposed changes

As a result of the above announcement, decisions on the NCC 2025 have been delayed and are almost certain to not occur until after the federal election.

In response to industry pressures and the magnitude of NCC 2022, proposed changes in NCC 2025 are modest in scale.

As per a public comment draft that was released last year, significant proposed amendments include:

• Implementing the next stage of tighter energy efficiency requirements for commercial buildings and the common areas of Class 2 apartment buildings.
• Changes to reduce the incidence of water leaks and ingress into apartments and commercial buildings.
• Additional changes that build on previous code amendments to further reduce the risk of condensation in new buildings.
• Increasing the provision of toilets for women at single auditorium theatres and cinemas.
• Tighter fire safety requirements for carparks.
• Removing the potential to use expert judgement as a pathway through which compliance with the performance requirements of the Code can be assessed in respect of matters concerning structural or fire safety.

Modelling suggests that benefits will be significant.

With respect of the waterproofing changes, for instance, the changes were expected to add approximately $900 per dwelling to upfront costs of new apartments.

Against this, however, the changes are expected to help to avoid water leaks which cost on average $2,000 to $11,000 to rectify.

Despite this, there had been pressure from some building industry lobby groups to push back the NCC 2025 adoption. This push has been made in response to current industry pressures and recognition of the compliance burden which NCC 2022 placed upon the industry.

No need for panic

Whilst the future of NCC 2025 remains uncertain, a leading expert says that this is not a reason for panic.

Neil Savery, managing director of the Oceania region for the International Code Council and a former CEO of the ABCB, said that the delay to NCC 2025 is not a cause for excessive concern.

“Bearing in mind that NCC 2022 was not adopted in accordance with the regular updating cycle, I don’t believe we should be overly concerned as to whether or not it is a particular day of a particular month, provided that 1) when it occurs it is adopted at the same time nationally and as far as is practicable, is adopted in a nationally consistent manner, including any subject matter transition periods; 2) that any deferral is not pushed so far down the track that it has a concertina affect on the next edition of the NCC, as inevitably that will either require the next edition to be pushed out or timeframes for next edition content is compressed, which might result in compromising on good process,” Savery said.

“Whilst it would be ideal to operate within a regular and predictable pattern of edition changes, the most important issue is what the content changes are and whether they are time critical. It is for that reason that when the 3-year cycle was introduced, an out-of-cycle amendment provision was included within the IGA to allow for any urgent public health and safety matters to be dealt with (this, however, should be used sparingly as it can be very disruptive).”

Asked about the likely reasons for the delay, Savery believes that this relates to the timing of both the upcoming federal election and the recent Western Australia election.

In particular, a meeting at which the nation’s building ministers were set to consider the changes was initially pushed back from last November until February. This has since been deferred to a date which is yet to be determined.  It is likely that the timing of both the WA and federal elections have been factors in these deferrals, Savery said.

(image via freepix (Ai generated)

A maintenance and upkeep edition

Regarding the content of the proposed changes, Savery described NCC 2025 as being predominately a ‘maintenance’ and upkeep exercise.

However, he stressed that the proposed changes highlight the need for ongoing maintenance and updating of the Code. Blanket freezes on this process should be avoided, Savery says.

“NCC 2025 to me is more of a maintenance edition,” Savery said.

“Keep the Code current (e.g. with the latest version of referenced standards), a few clarifications, technical improvements to provisions in response to proposals for change, some important quantification measures, which if they are delayed doesn’t change what has been around for 25 years, EV charging, tweaking for commercial and residential energy efficiency and condensation management provisions, and adequate toilet facilities for women in certain venues. All helpful.

“The proposed changes to improve the product testing requirements and the opportunity for practitioners to use different versions of referenced standards are useful innovations.

“If anything, whilst none of these changes are necessarily ground-breaking new policy initiatives, they serve to demonstrate the potential pitfalls of putting a blanket freeze on adopting amendments to the NCC, because much of the work is around maintaining the code provisions to be current, responsive, workable and therefore industry enabling.”

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