Part 3: Building Act 1984 Building control authorities and building regulations Section 38: Compliance and stop notices Effect
Subsection (1) of this section enables the building control authority (i.e. the Building Safety Regulator or local authority) to issue compliance or stop notices where there is or is likely to be a contravention of building regulations by inserting new sections 35B to 35D into the 1984 Act.
	A compliance notice (new section 35B) can be served on a person who is contravening, or is likely to contravene, building regulations or a requirement imposed under building regulations. This notice will require the person to remedy the contravention or to take the steps detailed in the notice within the specified period. This will be most useful in respect of non-safety related obligations outlined in building regulations, such as the provision of broadband.
	Where work is being carried out that contravenes one or more particular provisions of building regulations that are specified in regulations for this purpose, where a compliance notice has not been complied with, or where work would present a risk of serious harm to people in or about the building if the building were used without the contravention being remedied, a stop notice (new section 35C) can be issued, to require a person to stop all work specified in the notice (which could be all work on that project). Once issued, it will take force immediately or from a date specified in the notice. The power to specify particular provisions of the building regulations is intended in England to enable the Building Safety Regulator to stop work immediately on sites where Gateway requirements have been breached. The Gateway requirements will be set out in building regulations made under new paragraphs 1A and 1B of Schedule 1 to the Building Act 1984, which are inserted by section 33 of this Act and relate only to higher-risk buildings.
	In line with the existing enforcement protection in section 36(5) of the Building Act 1984, new section 35D(4) sets out that compliance notices and stop notices under section 35C(1)(a) cannot be issued where an application for building control approval in respect of non-higher risk building work has been granted by a building control authority and the contravention consists solely of carrying out the approved work etc. This protection does not apply to stop notices issued under new section 35C(1)(b) or (c). This is because, for subsection (1)(b), the protections would prevent a compliance notice being issued, so it could not be breached; and, for subsection (1)(c), the level of danger present ("the risk of serious harm condition") means that the protections are inappropriate.
	These notices will be appealable to the First-tier Tribunal in England and the magistrates’ court in Wales (subsection (2), inserting new section 39A into the Building Act 1984). Appeal of a compliance notice will suspend the effect of the notice itself. Given the increased seriousness of the issues justifying the issue of a stop notice, an appeal against such a notice will not suspend its effect (although an application may be made to the First-tier Tribunal or magistrates’ court for the effect of a stop notice to be suspended pending appeal).
	If the person issued with a compliance or stop notice breaches the notice, the building control authority will be able to prosecute for the breach. The offence of breaching a notice will be triable either way, reflecting not only the contravention of building regulations, but also that a formal opportunity to rectify it has been refused. If tried in a magistrates’ court, the offence will carry a maximum penalty of an unlimited fine and/or the maximum term of imprisonment permitted in a magistrates’ court, which is defined in section 126 of the Building Act (as amended by paragraph 81 of Schedule 5 to this Act) as 12 months (six months until the commencement of paragraph 24(2) of Schedule 22 to the Sentencing Act 2020). If tried in the Crown court, the maximum penalty will be an unlimited fine and/or two years’ imprisonment.