Most of what we write about here concerns disputes that have already started: a defect that's surfaced, a payment that hasn't been made, a delay that's dragged on. This one is different. On 4 August 2026, NSW Parliament passed the Building (Approvals and Practitioners) Bill 2026, and once it takes effect it will change the basic mechanics of how building work in this state gets approved, and who's allowed to sign off on it.
The Bill hasn't commenced yet. It's awaiting Royal Assent, and the substantive provisions won't start until a date is set by proclamation, which hasn't happened. But the scale of the change is worth understanding now, whether you're partway through a build, run a building or certification business, or are simply planning to build or renovate once the new system is in place.
At its core, the Bill replaces two of the most familiar documents in NSW construction (the construction certificate and the occupation certificate) with new equivalents: a building approval and a completion approval. These aren't just renamed versions of the old certificates; the Bill establishes a new, consolidated framework for how approvals are applied for, decided, varied and enforced, and makes consequential amendments to the Environmental Planning and Assessment Act 1979 (NSW) to fit the new terminology and process into the existing planning system.
For homeowners, the practical shape of the process (apply for approval before work starts, get sign-off once it's finished) stays broadly familiar. What's changing is the framework behind it: who can grant these approvals, what they're required to check, and what happens when something goes wrong. The Bill also formally provides for staged approvals, letting building work be approved and inspected in defined stages rather than all at once, which is useful on a longer or more complex project and a more structured version of how staging is sometimes handled informally today. If a council or other approval authority refuses an application, or simply doesn't decide it within the required time, the Bill preserves a right of appeal, similar to the appeal rights that exist under the current system.
The Bill repeals two Acts that have governed building certification and practitioner registration in NSW: the Building and Development Certifiers Act 2018 and the Design and Building Practitioners Act 2020, along with their regulations. In their place, the Bill creates one consolidated registration regime: covering who can carry out "registered work", how registration is granted, varied, suspended or cancelled, and what registration holders must maintain, including insurance arrangements, while they're registered.
This matters because those two repealed Acts currently do a lot of the heavy lifting in NSW building regulation. The Design and Building Practitioners Act, in particular, introduced the statutory duty of care that lets homeowners and owners corporations sue for economic loss caused by defective building work, even without a direct contract with the person responsible. That duty of care isn't disappearing. The new Bill carries it forward in its own dedicated Part, with largely the same substance: a non-delegable duty owed to current and future owners, extending to economic loss suffered by owners corporations and community associations, and one that can't be contracted out of. It's simply being relocated into the new, consolidated Act rather than left behind in the repealed one.
For the first time, NSW building law will formally define a "prefabricated building" and set out specific rules for it: a substantially complete building or building component manufactured off-site and then installed. Anyone supplying a prefabricated building will be required to provide a prefabricated building declaration and prefabricated building instructions, with an offence for supplying one without them, and separate provision for buildings manufactured outside NSW.
This is a genuinely new regulatory space rather than a renaming exercise. Modular and prefabricated construction has grown quickly in NSW as a way of speeding up housing delivery, but until now it's sat somewhat awkwardly alongside a certification system built around traditional, site-built construction. Buyers of prefabricated homes should get clearer, more specific protections once this framework commences, which is worth knowing if that's a path you're considering for a build.
Not sure how this affects a current build, a prefab project, or your registration?
The Bill hasn't commenced yet, but it's a major structural change once it does. Talk to our Building and Construction team about what to watch for.
Free consultationAlongside the new approvals and registration framework, the Bill gives the Secretary of the Department of Customer Service (which administers building regulation in NSW) an expanded set of powers to investigate and act on non-compliance. These include powers to investigate complaints, issue warning notices, apply to a court to restrain or remedy a contravention, and conduct audits of registered practitioners' work, on top of the information-gathering and premises-entry powers authorised officers already have under current law. For homeowners, this is really the flip side of the registration changes: a single regulator with clearer, more consolidated powers to act if a registered practitioner falls short, rather than accountability split across the two separate Acts being repealed.
As at the date of this article, the Bill has passed both Houses of the NSW Parliament (4 August 2026) but has not yet received Royal Assent, and is not yet law. Once assented, most of its provisions commence on a date to be set by proclamation, which has not been announced. In practical terms, that means there's no fixed start date yet, and it could be some months before the new approvals and registration regime actually takes effect.
The Bill also allows for savings and transitional regulations to be made: covering, for example, how existing construction certificates, occupation certificates and current practitioner registrations under the old Acts are treated once the new regime starts. Those regulations haven't been published yet. Until they are, it isn't possible to say precisely how an approval or registration obtained under the current system will carry across, though transitional arrangements of this kind are standard practice when NSW replaces a certification regime, and existing approvals are not typically invalidated overnight.
If you're currently building, renovating, or waiting on a construction certificate or occupation certificate, nothing changes for you today. The current system (construction certificates, occupation certificates, and certifiers and practitioners registered under the existing Acts) continues to operate exactly as it does now until the new Act commences and any transitional regulations are in place.
What's worth doing now is simply keeping an eye on the commencement date once it's proclaimed, particularly if your project is likely to still be underway when the new regime starts, or if you're a builder, certifier or other registered practitioner whose registration will need to transition across. We'll cover the transitional detail in a further update once the regulations are published.
This is a state law, so it applies the same way everywhere in NSW: there's no region where the new approvals and registration regime works differently. What does vary regionally is exposure: areas with the highest volumes of current building activity and the largest number of registered certifiers and practitioners will feel the transition most, simply because more approvals and registrations are moving across to the new system at once. Growth corridors across Western Sydney, the Illawarra and the state's fastest-growing regional centres, where a high volume of both traditional and prefabricated construction is underway, are the areas most likely to notice the shift in practice once it commences.
If you have a question about how this Bill (or the current approvals system, while we wait for it) affects a specific project, our Building and Construction team can help, and where a matter touches an owners corporation or strata scheme, our Strata and Community Title team can advise on the Strata Schemes Management Act changes the Bill also makes. Speak to our team, or get in touch for a free consultation.
This publication is intended as general information only and does not constitute legal advice. Please seek independent legal advice before acting on anything contained in it.
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No. The Bill has passed Parliament but has not yet received Royal Assent or commenced. The current system of construction certificates, occupation certificates, and certifier and practitioner registration continues to operate exactly as it does now until a commencement date is proclaimed.
The Bill allows for savings and transitional regulations dealing with existing certificates and registrations, but those regulations haven't been published yet. Once they are, we'll have a clearer picture of exactly how current approvals carry across to the new "building approval" and "completion approval" regime.
Both of those Acts are repealed by the Bill and replaced with a single, consolidated registration regime. Existing registrations will be affected by the transition, but the detail of how depends on regulations that have not yet been made public.
Broadly, a substantially complete building or building component manufactured off-site and then installed. The Bill introduces the first NSW framework specifically regulating prefabricated and modular construction, including a requirement for suppliers to provide a prefabricated building declaration and instructions.
Yes. The duty of care introduced by the Design and Building Practitioners Act 2020 (which lets homeowners and owners corporations claim for economic loss caused by defective work even without a direct contract) is carried forward into the new Act rather than lost when the old Act is repealed.
There's no fixed date yet. The Bill commences by proclamation, and that date hasn't been announced. It could be some months before the new regime takes effect.
Yes, in two ways: the new approvals regime applies to strata developments the same as any other building work, and the Bill separately amends the Strata Schemes Management Act 2015 to align its references to certificates with the new approval terminology.
Not yet, but it's worth watching for the commencement date and the transitional regulations once they're published, particularly if your current registration will need to move across to the new consolidated regime.
