Buildings: Safety
The question
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, with reference her Department's consultation response entitled, Building Safety Levy: Technical consultation response, published on 25 March 2025, if the Building Safety Levy will apply to (a) live sites at the time of implementation and (b) new sites after the implementation of the levy.
Answered by Alex Norris
The Building Safety Levy (levy) is one of a package of measures to make sure that the burden of paying for fixing historical building safety defects does not fall on leaseholders or further burden taxpayers.
Developers will pay the levy on new residential development, subject to certain exemptions. It will come into effect in Autumn 2026. Anyone submitting an application for building control approval with full plans, a building control approval application (made to the Building Safety Regulator), or an initial notice for construction of, or works to, one or more dwellings or purpose built student accommodation (PBSA), after the levy has come into effect, will be liable to pay the levy, except where an exemption applies. The levy will not apply to applications for new dwellings that were submitted before the coming-into-force date.
The design of the levy maintains viability of new developments as far as possible through variable levy rates at local authority level and a 50% discount on developments on previously developed land, reflecting the additional costs of building on these sites. Affordable housing and community facilities are exempt from the levy.
The rates for each local authority can be found at Annex A: Levy Rates of the Building Safety Levy: Technical consultation response.
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