CPA launching post-Grenfell code for construction products

A consultation process is to be launched with the view of creating a new code that will aim to set a benchmark for how construction products are marketed.

It is being led by the Construction Products Association (CPA) as they look to gather industry-wide feedback on their Code for Construction Product Information (CCPI), which has been created following testimony at the ongoing public inquiry into the tragic Grenfell Tower fire in 2017.

It responds to the issues that were raised by Dame Judith Hackitt in her 2018 report on building safety and has been developed by the CPA’s Marketing Integrity Group (MIG). The report concluded that the way in which construction products were tested and presented needed a radical overhaul.

The MIG carried out a survey in 2019 that gained more than 500 responses from companies across the industry on how the presentation of product information needed reforming. Eleven clauses have been put into the new code and any manufacturers that sign up must abide by its rules.

It is our responsibility as an industry to regain public trust.

Included in the code is a pledge to not use misleading or ambiguous language when promoting information about a product as well as having a training programme in place to ensure that people have the correct level of knowledge required for their role when conveying any product information.

There will be a two-month consultation process that opens on 1st February 2021. This aims to allow manufacturers, specifiers and other users of information to comment on the code, the implementation of its 11 clauses and its ongoing management and policing. To preserve subjectivity, MRA research will independently carry out the consultation process.

CPA chief executive, Peter Caplehorn, said: “The importance of this new code and consultation process will be obvious to all those working in the built environment post-Grenfell. It is our responsibility as an industry to regain public trust and credibility in what we do and to demonstrate that technical competence can be trusted.”