Why Is Asbestos Not Covered by the COSHH Regulations?
If you’ve ever asked why is asbestos not covered by the COSHH regulations, you’re not alone. It’s one of the most common points of confusion for duty holders, facilities managers, and contractors who deal with hazardous substances in the workplace. The short answer: asbestos is considered so uniquely dangerous — and so deeply embedded in the UK’s built environment — that it demanded its own dedicated legal framework, entirely separate from general hazardous substances law.
Understanding that distinction isn’t just academic. It has direct implications for how you manage your legal duties, what surveys you need, and who can lawfully carry out work on asbestos-containing materials (ACMs) in your building.
Get it wrong, and you’re looking at criminal liability, unlimited fines, and — far more seriously — workers or occupants exposed to one of the most lethal substances ever used in construction.
COSHH vs the Control of Asbestos Regulations: What’s the Difference?
The Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regulations (COSHH) provides the general legal framework for managing hazardous substances in the workplace. It covers chemicals, fumes, dusts, biological agents, and a wide range of materials that could harm workers’ health.
However, COSHH explicitly excludes certain substances governed by their own, more specific regulations. Asbestos is one of them — alongside lead and radioactive materials.
The reason is straightforward: the risks posed by asbestos fibres are so severe, and the legacy of asbestos use in UK buildings so extensive, that a general hazardous substances framework simply wasn’t sufficient. Instead, asbestos is governed by the Control of Asbestos Regulations (CAR). These regulations go considerably further than COSHH ever could — covering not just workplace exposure, but also the identification, management, surveying, licensing, removal, and disposal of ACMs across all non-domestic premises in Great Britain.
Why a Separate Legal Framework Was Necessary
COSHH is designed to manage the ongoing use of hazardous substances in work processes — substances that are actively introduced into the workplace and can, in principle, be substituted or eliminated. Asbestos presents a fundamentally different challenge.
It’s already there. It’s embedded in millions of buildings across the UK. It isn’t being introduced — it was installed decades ago and is now largely dormant, but potentially lethal the moment it’s disturbed without proper controls.
Managing that kind of legacy hazard required a legal framework specifically designed for the scale and nature of the problem. A framework built around substituting chemicals in a lab or factory process was never going to be fit for purpose.
The Scale of the Problem
Asbestos is the single greatest cause of work-related deaths in the UK. Diseases including mesothelioma, asbestosis, and asbestos-related lung cancer kill thousands of people every year — and the majority of those deaths are linked to exposures that occurred decades ago, often during routine maintenance or building work.
Any building constructed or refurbished before the year 2000 may contain ACMs. There are millions of such buildings still in active use today — offices, schools, hospitals, warehouses, and residential blocks. The sheer scale of that legacy meant that a framework designed for managing chemicals in a controlled work process simply couldn’t do the job.
Unlike a chemical substance that can be swapped out for a safer alternative, asbestos can’t be substituted. The only options are to manage it safely in situ or remove it entirely — and both require a regulated, structured approach that COSHH was never designed to deliver.
The Control of Asbestos Regulations: The Core Legal Framework
The Control of Asbestos Regulations consolidate earlier asbestos legislation into a single, unified framework. They apply to all non-domestic premises and place legal duties on anyone responsible for the maintenance or repair of a building — whether that’s a landlord, employer, facilities manager, or building owner.
CAR covers every stage of the asbestos management process, from initial identification through to licensed removal and disposal. Its core requirements include:
- Identification: Duty holders must take reasonable steps to find out whether ACMs are present in their premises and assess their condition.
- Risk assessment: A formal assessment must determine the likelihood of fibre release and the level of risk posed by any ACMs identified.
- Asbestos register: A written record of the location, type, and condition of all known or presumed ACMs must be maintained and kept current.
- Asbestos management plan: A documented plan must set out how ACMs will be managed, monitored, and — where necessary — removed.
- Information sharing: Anyone who may disturb ACMs, including contractors and maintenance workers, must be informed of their location and condition before work begins.
- Training: Workers liable to encounter asbestos during their duties must receive appropriate training.
Failure to comply with CAR is a criminal offence. The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) can issue enforcement notices, prohibit work activities, prosecute duty holders personally, and seek unlimited fines in the Crown Court.
The Duty to Manage: Who Is Responsible?
The duty to manage sits at the heart of CAR. If you own, occupy, or are responsible for maintaining a non-domestic building, this duty applies to you. That includes offices, shops, warehouses, schools, hospitals, and the communal areas of residential blocks such as corridors, stairwells, and plant rooms.
Private homes are not covered in the same way, but landlords letting residential properties still carry obligations under other health and safety legislation — particularly where common areas are involved.
What Managing Asbestos Actually Means in Practice
The duty to manage does not mean you must immediately remove every piece of asbestos in your building. In many cases, ACMs in good condition and in low-risk locations are best left undisturbed and monitored.
What the duty does require is that you:
- Know what ACMs are present and where they are located
- Assess the risk they pose in their current condition
- Have a plan in place to manage that risk
- Review and update your register and management plan regularly
- Ensure anyone doing work in the building is made aware of ACMs before they start
If you don’t have an asbestos register in place — or yours hasn’t been reviewed recently — you are very likely in breach of the regulations right now.
Types of Asbestos Surveys Required Under CAR
Before you can manage asbestos, you need to know what’s there. That requires a formal asbestos survey carried out by a qualified surveyor. There are three main survey types, each serving a distinct purpose under the regulations.
Management Survey
This is the standard survey required for occupied, non-domestic premises. A management survey locates and assesses ACMs that could be disturbed during normal occupancy — routine maintenance, minor repairs, fitting shelving, and similar day-to-day activities.
It forms the basis of your asbestos register and management plan. If you don’t have one in place, this is where to start.
Refurbishment Survey
Required before any refurbishment work is carried out, a refurbishment survey is a more intrusive inspection that accesses areas not normally disturbed during day-to-day occupation — inside wall cavities, behind fixtures, beneath floors.
It must be completed before refurbishment begins to protect contractors and satisfy CAR requirements. There are no shortcuts here — starting refurbishment without this survey in place puts lives at risk and exposes you to serious legal consequences.
Demolition Survey
A demolition survey is a full, intrusive inspection required before a building is demolished. Every ACM must be identified and removed before demolition can take place. This is the most comprehensive survey type and is a legal prerequisite for any demolition project — there are no exceptions.
Re-inspection Survey
Having an asbestos survey done once isn’t enough. The condition of ACMs changes over time — materials deteriorate, buildings get modified, and new risks emerge. A re-inspection survey should be scheduled at regular intervals — typically annually for higher-risk materials, and at least every two to three years for materials in better condition.
If your register hasn’t been reviewed since it was first produced, it may no longer be accurate. Relying on an out-of-date register could put contractors and building occupants at serious risk — and won’t protect you from enforcement action.
Asbestos Licensing: Who Can Actually Do the Work?
One of the most important — and most frequently misunderstood — aspects of CAR is the licensing regime. Not all asbestos work is equal, and the regulations divide it into three categories based on risk.
Licensed Work
The highest-risk asbestos work must only be carried out by contractors holding an HSE asbestos licence. This includes removal of asbestos insulation, lagging, and sprayed coatings, as well as any work where fibres may be released in significant quantities.
Licensed contractors must notify the relevant enforcing authority before starting work, and operatives must hold current medical surveillance certificates.
Notifiable Non-Licensed Work (NNLW)
Some lower-risk work doesn’t require a licence but must still be notified to the enforcing authority before it begins. Workers carrying out NNLW must receive appropriate training and medical surveillance. This category exists because the work still carries meaningful risk — it simply falls below the threshold requiring full licensing.
Non-Licensed Work
The lowest-risk category covers minor work on materials such as textured coatings or asbestos cement in good condition. No licence or notification is required, but work must still follow safe working practices and relevant HSE guidance.
Getting this wrong has serious consequences. Commissioning unlicensed contractors for licensed work is a criminal offence — and claiming ignorance is not a defence.
Exposure Limits and Control Measures
Where asbestos work is taking place, CAR sets a control limit for airborne asbestos fibres. This is the maximum concentration of fibres permitted in the air that workers breathe during any given period. Critically, this is a legal ceiling — not a safe level.
There is no known safe threshold for asbestos exposure. The objective is always to reduce exposure to as low as reasonably practicable, well below the control limit.
In practice, this requires:
- Enclosure and negative pressure units to contain fibre release
- Respiratory protective equipment (RPE) appropriate to the level of risk
- Disposable coveralls and decontamination facilities on site
- Air monitoring during and after removal work
- Clearance air testing before a licensed enclosure is re-occupied
Personal protective equipment is the last line of defence, not a substitute for proper engineering controls. Any reputable asbestos contractor will always prioritise containment and enclosure before relying on PPE alone.
The Role of HSE Guidance: HSG264 and Beyond
Alongside CAR itself, the HSE publishes detailed technical guidance to help duty holders and contractors meet their legal obligations. The most significant of these is HSG264 — the HSE’s guidance document on asbestos surveying.
HSG264 sets out the standards surveyors must meet, the methodology they should follow, and the information that survey reports must contain. It isn’t itself a legal requirement in the same way as CAR, but it represents the standard against which surveying work is judged.
A survey that doesn’t comply with HSG264 is unlikely to satisfy your legal obligations under CAR. When commissioning a survey, always check that the surveyor works to HSG264 standards — and ask for evidence of their accreditation.
The HSE also publishes approved codes of practice (ACoPs) for specific types of asbestos work, including licensed removal. An ACoP carries significant legal weight: if you’re prosecuted for a breach of the regulations, departing from the relevant ACoP without equivalent or better controls will be taken as evidence of non-compliance.
Asbestos Surveys Across the UK: Getting the Right Support
The legal obligations under CAR apply equally whether your premises are in central London, the North West, or the West Midlands. The challenge is ensuring the surveyor you appoint has the expertise, accreditation, and local knowledge to deliver a report that genuinely satisfies your duties.
If you’re based in the capital and need an asbestos survey in London, Supernova’s teams operate across all London boroughs and can mobilise quickly for urgent requirements. For businesses and landlords in the North West, our asbestos survey Manchester service covers the city and surrounding areas with the same rigorous standards. And for properties across the Midlands, our asbestos survey Birmingham team delivers fully accredited surveys with fast turnaround times.
Wherever your premises are located, the legal framework is the same — and so is the standard of work you should expect from your surveyor.
Common Mistakes Duty Holders Make — and How to Avoid Them
Even well-intentioned duty holders can fall foul of CAR. These are the most frequent errors we encounter:
- Assuming a building is asbestos-free without a survey. If the building was constructed or refurbished before 2000, assumption is not enough — a formal survey is required.
- Treating the survey report as a one-time document. Your register and management plan must be reviewed and updated regularly, not filed away after the initial survey.
- Failing to share asbestos information with contractors. Every contractor working in your building must be made aware of known or presumed ACMs before they start. This is a legal duty, not a courtesy.
- Using unlicensed contractors for higher-risk work. Always verify a contractor’s HSE licence before commissioning removal work — and keep a record that you did so.
- Confusing COSHH and CAR responsibilities. If your health and safety management system treats asbestos under a general COSHH assessment, it’s almost certainly inadequate. Asbestos requires its own dedicated management arrangements under CAR.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why is asbestos not covered by the COSHH regulations?
Asbestos is explicitly excluded from COSHH because its risks are so severe, and its presence in the UK’s built environment so widespread, that a general hazardous substances framework was insufficient. Instead, asbestos is governed by its own dedicated legislation — the Control of Asbestos Regulations — which covers identification, management, surveying, licensing, removal, and disposal of asbestos-containing materials across all non-domestic premises.
What is the Control of Asbestos Regulations and who does it apply to?
The Control of Asbestos Regulations is the primary UK legislation governing asbestos in the workplace and non-domestic buildings. It applies to anyone who owns, occupies, or is responsible for maintaining a non-domestic building — including landlords, employers, facilities managers, and building owners. It also applies to contractors carrying out work that may disturb ACMs.
Do I need an asbestos survey if my building was built after 2000?
Buildings constructed entirely after November 1999 are unlikely to contain asbestos, as its use in construction was banned in the UK by that point. However, if there is any doubt about construction or refurbishment dates, or if the building incorporated materials from an earlier structure, a survey is still advisable. If in doubt, always commission a survey — the cost of getting it wrong is far greater.
How often should an asbestos management plan be reviewed?
The Control of Asbestos Regulations require that asbestos management plans are kept up to date. In practice, this means scheduling regular re-inspection surveys — typically annually for higher-risk materials and at least every two to three years for materials in better condition. The plan should also be reviewed whenever there are changes to the building, its use, or the condition of known ACMs.
What happens if I don’t comply with the Control of Asbestos Regulations?
Non-compliance with CAR is a criminal offence. The HSE can issue enforcement notices, prohibit work activities, and prosecute duty holders personally. Cases heard in the Crown Court can result in unlimited fines and, in serious cases, custodial sentences. Beyond the legal consequences, the human cost of asbestos exposure — mesothelioma, asbestosis, and lung cancer — makes compliance a moral obligation as much as a legal one.
Get Expert Asbestos Survey Support from Supernova
With over 50,000 surveys completed across the UK, Supernova Asbestos Surveys has the expertise, accreditation, and nationwide reach to help you meet every obligation under the Control of Asbestos Regulations — from initial management surveys through to re-inspection programmes and specialist demolition surveys.
Whether you’re a facilities manager getting your register in order for the first time, a landlord preparing for a refurbishment, or a contractor needing a fast-turnaround survey before work begins, our team is ready to help.
Call us on 020 4586 0680 or visit asbestos-surveys.org.uk to book your survey or speak to one of our qualified surveyors today.