Demolition is programmed to start on the 5th. The client signed three weeks later than anyone planned for, so the notice to the council went in on the 24th of last month, and the six weeks the council is entitled to does not run out until the 5th of the month after. The hoarding is up. The high-reach is booked and the hire desk wants an answer.
A Section 80 demolition notice is the written notice you have to give the local authority, under section 80 of the Building Act 1984, before you begin demolishing all or part of a building in England or Wales. It is a notification rather than an application. Nobody grants it, and there is no approval to wait for. What there is, is a period the authority gets to respond in, and you cannot lawfully start until that period has run or the authority has answered.
When does a Section 80 demolition notice apply, and when does it not?
The default is broad. Section 80 catches any demolition of the whole or part of a building, which includes partial demolition, facade retention schemes and taking down a rear extension. The exceptions are narrow and worth knowing precisely, because contractors routinely assume they fall into one and do not.
| Excepted from Section 80 | The detail |
|---|---|
| Demolition under a demolition order or obstructive building order | Where the order is made under Part IX of the Housing Act 1985 |
| Internal demolition in an occupied building | Only where the building is occupied and is intended to stay occupied. An empty building being stripped before it comes down is not covered by this |
| Small buildings | Cubic content of no more than 1,750 cubic feet, measured externally. That is roughly 50 cubic metres, which is a small garage rather than a small house |
| Greenhouses, conservatories, sheds and prefabricated garages | Where they form part of a larger building |
| Agricultural buildings | As defined in the Local Government Finance Act 1988, and only where the building is not contiguous with a non-agricultural building |
Note what is absent from that list. There is no exception for a building that is already derelict, none for a site with planning permission, and none for a demolition that the client is in a hurry about.
What goes in the notice, and who else gets a copy
The Act asks for two things in the notice itself: the building it relates to, and the works of demolition intended to be carried out. That second phrase does more work than most notices give it credit for. A notice that says demolish the building tells building control nothing about sequence, method, party walls or what happens to the flank wall of the terrace next door, and a building control officer who cannot picture the job will come back with questions.
Then there are the copies. Serving the council is only part of it. The person giving the notice has a duty to send or give a copy to:
- The occupier of any building adjacent to the one being demolished
- The public gas supplier in whose authorised area the building sits
- The public electricity supplier in whose authorised area the building sits, plus any other licensed supplier of electricity to that building
The adjacent occupier copy is the one that gets skipped, and it is the one that causes trouble. An adjoining owner who first learns about a demolition when the scaffold arrives will phone the council, and a council fielding complaints is a council that starts asking questions you now have to answer inside your programme.
Starting a demolition that Section 80 applies to without having given the notice and waited is an offence, punishable on summary conviction by a fine not exceeding level 4 on the standard scale.
The six weeks, and what the council can do with it
The clock is set by section 81. The relevant period is six weeks from the giving of the Section 80 notice, unless the person who gave the notice agrees in writing to a longer one. Within that window the authority can serve a counter-notice, and once it has, you can proceed. If it does not, you can proceed when the six weeks expire.
So a counter-notice is not the bad news people assume. It can release you early. The cost is that you then have to do whatever it requires, and section 82 gives the authority a wide menu:
- Shore up any adjacent building
- Weatherproof surfaces of an adjacent building exposed by the demolition
- Repair and make good damage caused to an adjacent building, including damage caused by a negligent act or omission of anyone engaged in the work
- Remove material and rubbish, and clear the site
- Disconnect and seal any sewer or drain in or under the building, at points the authority reasonably requires
- Remove any such sewer or drain and seal the ones it connects to
- Make good the ground surface disturbed by that work
- Arrange disconnection of gas, electricity and water with the relevant statutory undertakers
- Agree arrangements for burning structures or materials on site with the fire authority, and with HSE where the premises are special premises
- Take steps on how the demolition is carried out and how the site is left, where the authority considers it reasonably necessary to protect the public or preserve public amenity
Two of those carry their own clocks. Before you comply with a requirement to disconnect, seal or remove a sewer or drain, you owe the authority at least 48 hours notice. Before you make good the ground afterwards, at least 24 hours. Missing either is a separate offence at level 2 on the standard scale, and it is the sort of thing that gets missed on a Friday afternoon.
One useful piece of hierarchy: where a requirement in a Section 81 notice conflicts with a duty under health and safety legislation, the health and safety duty wins. A council cannot require you into an unsafe method.
How Section 80 sits alongside planning and the F10
These get conflated constantly, usually by clients. They are separate regimes with separate recipients, and satisfying one does nothing for the others.
| Requirement | What it is | Who receives it | Does it stop you starting? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Section 80 notice | Notice of intended demolition under the Building Act 1984 | Local authority (building control) | Yes. Six weeks, or until a Section 81 notice is served |
| Planning permission or prior approval | Consent for the demolition as development, where it is needed | Local planning authority | Yes, where it applies. Conservation areas and listed buildings have their own regime |
| F10 notification | Notification of a notifiable project under CDM 2015 | HSE | No, but it has to be sent before the construction phase begins |
| Section 61 prior consent | Consent for the noise and vibration your method will generate, under the Control of Pollution Act 1974 | Local authority, environmental health | No, but going without it leaves you exposed to a Section 60 notice imposing conditions you have not priced |
A project is notifiable for F10 purposes if the construction work is likely to last longer than 30 working days and have more than 20 workers on site simultaneously at any point, or if it exceeds 500 person days. Plenty of demolition jobs need a Section 80 notice and no F10 at all.
How contractors lose the six weeks
Almost never by forgetting the notice exists. The losses are procedural, and they repeat.
The notice goes in describing the works in a single line, building control asks for the method and the sequence, a revised notice follows, and the six weeks is now being counted from a date three weeks later than the one on the programme. Or the notice is served by the demolition contractor, who is not appointed until four weeks after the client decided to proceed, so a month of the clock was burned while the tender was being evaluated. Or the adjacent occupier copy is missed, a complaint lands, and the job spends a fortnight in correspondence.
None of that is complicated work. It is a document with a distribution list and a deadline, which is exactly the category of task that falls between the estimator who priced the job and the site team who have not mobilised yet, and because nobody owns it, it happens late.
Most firms respond by putting a reminder in a diary. It works better to treat the notice as an output of the pre-construction sequence: it draws on the same survey information, the same drawings and the same method statement that feed the pre-demolition audit and the construction phase plan. Where a firm holds that information in one place, drafting the notice and its distribution list stops being a job for a person with a spare afternoon. Document automation handles the assembly. Someone competent still has to read it before it goes.
Common questions
Who serves the notice, the client or the contractor?
The Act puts the duty on the person beginning the demolition, which normally means the contractor. Nothing stops a client serving it earlier to protect the programme, and on any job where the six weeks is tight, they should. Serving early costs nothing.
Is there a fee?
Practice varies by authority. Check the council’s building control pages before you budget for it.
Does it apply to internal strip-out?
Usually not, where the building is occupied and staying occupied. Soft strip inside an empty building that is about to come down is a different matter, because that is part of the demolition and the exception does not reach it.
What happens if we start early?
Legally, an offence at level 4 on the standard scale. Commercially, the bigger exposure is a council that stops the job, an insurer asking questions and a client who now has a reason to look closely at everything else you have certified.
Does Section 80 apply in Scotland or Northern Ireland?
No. It is an England and Wales provision, and the other UK jurisdictions have their own building legislation.
Can the six weeks be shortened?
Only by the authority serving its counter-notice sooner. Some will, particularly where the site is straightforward and the notice arrived with enough detail to make a decision on. That is the practical argument for putting real detail in the notice.
Where this leaves you
Six weeks is nothing if the clock starts when the client signs. It is a very long time if it starts when the machine is booked.
Surtori works with demolition contractors on the document and notification workflows that sit between winning a job and mobilising on it. More on that on our page for operational efficiency for demolition contractors, or book a discovery call and we will walk through where your pre-construction clock is going.
The statutory detail above reflects the Building Act 1984 as in force in England and Wales at the time of writing. It is general information, not legal advice, and the position on any particular site should be checked with the relevant local authority.