ARB removes hundreds of architects from the register due to non-compliance with new CPD scheme

The ARB removed hundreds of architects from the register during the first year of its new mandatory CPD system, according to the regulator’s new report.

Last year was the first full year that registered architects were required to comply with ARB’s mandatory CPD scheme, which was introduced to improve competence in the profession following the Grenfell Tower fire.

The regulator estimated that more than 85% complied with the new statutory requirement with 270 removed from the register for non-compliance.

The report also found the number of CPD activities undertaken by architects fell below standards expected, with a median number of four against a recommended number of eight.

It admitted there was “significant variation” in the quality of recorded reflection, the process by which architects summarise how their learning affected practice.

The ARB said the CPD reflection remained a “year-end compliance exercise” rather than a core part of professional development, adding that compliance data alone “cannot demonstrate whether CPD is producing better professional outcomes”.

The regulator said it will develop a “proportionate approach” to assessing whether the scheme is helping architects improve practice and will issue expanded guidance on meaningful reflection.

It also revealed it is developing “automated tools” to flag missing information, incomplete CPD and “weak or absent” reflection as a means to speed up feedback, with all instances picked up by the technology subjected to “appropriate human review where regulatory decisions may follow”.

The report found more than 38,000 architects made CPD declarations during the year, with environmental sustainability and fire and life safety accounting for the largest shares of recorded activity at 24% and 18% respectively.

ARB chair Alan Kershaw said: Alan Kershaw, ARB Chair, said: “ARB’s 2025 CPD report provides encouraging evidence of the profession’s commitment to high standards. The high level of compliance matters, but compliance is not the ultimate purpose of CPD. 

“The greatest value of CPD comes when learning changes what an architect notices, asks, checks or does in their professional practice. The evidence from this first year will help us strengthen the scheme and better support architects to identify learning needs, reflect meaningfully and apply that learning in their professional practice.” 

The regulator said it is aiming to create a “matured” CPD scheme by 2030 which ensures architects consistently provide meaningful reflections and apply their learning in practice.