CPA Weekly Notes – 15th August 2025

Issue No. 1164, 15th August 2025 FOR MEMBERS ONLY

Association Activities

CPA Autumn Lunch 2025 | 13 Nov 2025 – Book your table
We’re excited to have you join us at the Brewery in London, on the 13th November 2025!
The CPA Autumn Lunch is recognised as one of the most important construction industry networking events, attracting a senior audience from across the construction supply chain including manufacturers and suppliers, clients, contractors, as well as influential political and media contacts. View this page to book your table. Single seats are also now available.

CPA Autumn Lunch 2025 – Get on board and sponsor our event
CPA’s lunches are recognised as one of the largest networking events in the industry – so why not get your brand recognised too? We have great sponsorship offerings to get you the best possible coverage, pre and post-event! Click here to view the sponsorship package. If you have any sponsorship related question, please get in touch with Fabi.

CPA Webinar Recording now available: Construction Industry Forecasts – Summer 2025 Edition 
Watch the recording of the forecasts webinar here. To download the latest Construction Industry Forecasts – Summer 2025 click here.

CPA Weekly Calendar of Meetings 

• Peter Caplehorn, CPA Chief Executive, will meet with members of the Fire Sector Confederation; and will chair a regular meeting of the Construction Leadership Council’s Standards & Regulatory Alignment Group.
• Mark Wilkinson, CPA Senior Technical Manager, will meet with Scottish Government representatives as part of the Building Standards Energy Review Working Group; and join the regular meeting of the Construction Leadership Council’s Standards & Regulatory Alignment Group.
• Jane Thornback, CPA Sustainability Policy Advisor, will meet with Defra officials and industry reps to discuss the definitions of household waste.

Economics Update

CPA Weekly UK Economic and Construction Update
The latest weekly update is available here, including:

• ONS Construction Output (June 2025)
• ONS and Barbour ABI Construction New Orders (2025 Q2)
• ONS UK Construction Employment (2025 Q2)
• RICS UK Residential Market Survey (July 2025)
• Persimmon Half Year Results (August 2025)
• Bellway Trading Update (August 2025)

The CPA’s Summer Forecasts, published 28 July, are available for members to download from the CPA Website.

CPA Briefing Paper:  The Impacts of U.S. Tariffs
Following strong demand from members and government alike, the CPA’s economics team has published a briefing paper on the ‘Impacts of U.S. Tariffs’.  This document will be revised as the situation develops, and made available to CPA members every Friday with our Weekly UK Economic and Construction Update (see above).  To receive this document via email every Friday please contact noble.francis@constructionproducts.org.uk; alternatively, you can click here to read it now.

Government Update

Parliament is now in Recess until the 1st September 

Consultation on Late Payments
The Department for Business and Trade has launched a consultation seeking views on proposed legislative measures to ensure companies pay their suppliers quickly and on time, including measures to address the use of retention clauses in construction contracts.  This is an important consultation for construction both in terms of the proposed options for retentions and the wider general payment measures.  DBT wants CPA members to recognise that retentions may not be a direct issue for our manufacturers, but payment certainly is.  The consultation runs for 12 weeks and closes on 23 October 2025. Further details can be found here.

House of Lords call for Evidence on the Building Safety Regulator
The House of Lords Industry and Regulators Committee, chaired by Baroness Taylor of Bolton, has launched an inquiry into building safety regulation, with a particular focus on the work of the Building Safety Regulator, which was established following the Building Safety Act 2022. Concerns have been raised by Industry that delays in approvals by the BSR have slowed down the delivery of new buildings and homes. The Committee invites interested individuals and organisations to submit evidence here by 31 August 2025.

Industry News

Government consultation on growing the market for low carbon industrial products – deadline 15 Sept
A reminder that there is just over one month left to respond to this government consultation on a technical consultation on a policy framework to grow the market for low carbon industrial products The CPA will be making a response and convened on 14 August as an opportunity for CPA members to engage with DESNZ officials directly. If you have views on the consultation, please do get in touch by contacting CPA Sustainability Policy Advisor Jane Thornback.

Building Safety Webinars
The Construction Leadership Council (CLC) and the Building Safety Regulator (BSR) will be hosting a joint webinar on Tuesday 9 September, 10am to 12 noon on Building Control Approval applications. The free webinar is aimed at developers in the construction industry who want to approach building control approval applications effectively, avoiding common mistakes. A panel discussion will cover the recently published CLC guidance for the Building Control Approval application process for a new Higher-Risk Building (HRB).
The CLC guidance suite was published in July 2025 and was developed by the CLC, BSR and industry experts. The guidance aims to provide the baseline principles to guide those involved in submitting and assessing applications for Building Control Approval applications (Gateway 2). While the guidance was developed for new build HRBs, many of the principles will also be helpful for existing HRBs. In addition, the BSR will also run the following webinars:

17 September – 10am to 12 noon – Building Control Approval demystified for SME developers
24 September – 10am to 12 noon – Building Assessment Certificate applications – lessons learned You can register for the webinars here.

CLC Guide on the Movement of People
The Construction Leadership Council has published an updated Movement of People Guide – Construction Leadership Council as the first changes set out in the Immigration White Paper have come into effect.  The updates include revised Skilled Worker Visa and Immigration Salary List sections, a new section on the recently introduced Temporary Shortage List, and other quality-of-life improvements to reflect the recent changes to the Points-Based Immigration System.

Building Safety Regulator Bulletin
The latest bulletin from the Regulator is available and includes updates on building control applications along with expert-led webinars.  Click here to read the latest.

National Manufacturing Day – 25 September 2025
National Manufacturing Day is an initiative from Make UK and more than 300 manufacturing businesses and organisations including the CPA that is meant to showcase the UK industry and inspire the next generation of engineers, designers, and wider workforce by showing them the exciting career opportunities in your sector.  Whether you’re a small local manufacturer or a household name, this is the perfect platform to open your doors and share your story with the future talent, the public and government. To learn more, please visit National Manufacturing Day or contact the team at Make UK with your questions.

Department for Business and Trade to review of the UK’s machinery safety legislation.
As part of the Department for Business and Trade’s review of the UK’s machinery safety legislation, there is a call for evidence and a series of stakeholder roundtables. These engagements aim to gather a broad range of views on potential reforms to the current regulatory framework, assess their impact on UK businesses and consumers, and explore opportunities to streamline implementation. This includes consideration of how any future changes could support the government’s ambition to reduce administrative costs and burdens on business.
Call for Evidence
The call for evidence seeks views on the potential benefits of enacting similar changes in Great Britain as apply in Northern Ireland and the EU, and on the impact of potentially continuing CE recognition for Machinery in Great Britain. This will help to inform the future regulatory position across the whole of the UK. You can access the call for evidence here. The deadline for responses is Monday 20 October 2025. Contributions are welcome from all interested parties, including manufacturers, importers, trade associations, consumers, and others with an interest in machinery regulation.

CPA in the News

What can architects learn about new guidance around products critical to safe construction?
Developed in collaboration with the Construction Products Association, the Code for Construction Product Information (CCPI), the Institution of Structural Engineers, and RIBA, the guide is free to download and particularly relevant to designers. It focuses on identifying safety-critical products and systems, and outlines processes to demonstrate their compliance.
Architecture | 13/08/2025 |Online

Infrastructure strategy: the start of renewal?
“Long-term strategies and the spending plans to back them up give the construction industry an element of what it needs: certainty that there is a long-term pipeline of major projects with funding set aside,” said Rebecca Larkin, head of construction research at the Construction Products Association. She highlighted benefits including enabling manufacturers to plan for materials and product capacity and contractors to plan for peaks in workloads.
CN | 04/08/2025 |Online

Guide to Products Critical to Safe Construction published
The guide was published in collaboration with the Construction Products Association [CPA], Code for Construction Product Information [CCPI], Institution of Structural Engineers [IStructE] and Royal Institute of British Architects [RIBA].   
CIC | 05/08/2025 |Online
Also in Scottish Construction Now, Construction Management, Build News, Specification Online, CLC, IFSJ, Roofing Today.

Quiet month for business failures masks unresolved problems
“It’s good to see that administrations and insolvencies have slowed” as housebuilding gradually recovers, said Noble Francis, economics director at the Construction Products Association.
CN | 07/08/2025 |Online 

Bank of England interest rates ‘provides confidence’
“Today’s decision should be seen as a green light by investors,” Chetwood Bank chief executive, Paul Noble said in reaction to the interest rate cut. “Rates are now far below their peak, and the lending markets should respond in turn. Pent-up demand can now be released, and we should expect activity levels to rise in the aftermath of today’s news.” For Noble Francis at the Construction Products Association (CPA), the widely-forecasted lowering of the Bank of England’s base rate will have little immediate effect but will, nonetheless, be a welcome move.
CN | 07/08/2025 |Online

Brick, gravel and cement block sales fall in early summer
Noble Francis, economics director at the Construction Products Association, said the government data on brick consumption was a “useful proxy for housebuilding starts in the absence of monthly starts data”. “We would have expected deliveries to rise significantly in April, May and June, but demand and housebuilder near-term optimism has slowed significantly in 2025 Q2 [second quarter] and July,” he wrote on X. “Deliveries in June 2025 remained 18.9 per cent lower than the 2018-19 pre-pandemic average and 28.5 per cent lower than the post-pandemic peak of housebuilder optimism in early 2022. “The lack of significant pickup in demand and housebuilder optimism in 2025 Q2 and July is concerning as this would have been expected early in the year and is needed for housebuilding completions in 2025 H2 [second half].”
CN | 07/08/2025 |Online