Opinion – Page 572
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Comment
Third time unlucky
This is a successful appeal by the respondent, Kingston Upon Hull City Council, from the decision of the Court of Appeal reported in Legal Briefing No.8 of 2004. The applicant had worked for the respondent local authority as an environmental health officer and had been driven from his job by ...
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The tyranny of taste
The dead hand of totalitarian modernism should be prised from the shoulders of living architects: it was no more than a style among many others
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Counting all the costs
In the issue of 16 July, your leader referred to “consistently reduced construction costs”, and Alistair McAlpine commented that “a cheap price and a silver tongue” were generally accepted as “an alternative to expertise”.
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A binding non-binding decision
Tim Elliott (16 July, page 51) applauds the decision of His Honour Judge Thornton in William Verry Ltd vs North West London Communal Mikrah.
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Neanderthal Man alive and well
I was rather surprised to read your comment “Neanderthal Man no longer roams the sites of the land, terrorising small contractors with the assistance of fine legal minds” (16 July, page 3). My job for the past 10 years has been to defend my employer (a subcontractor) against precisely that. ...
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A reader writes: The facts of death
After our interview with the family of Patrick O’Sullivan, who was killed on the Wembley site, a reader gives us his experience of a fatality during a concrete pour
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Wonders & blunders
Tony Bingham is left aesthetically stranded by the RAC control centre on the M6, but the Bilbao Guggenheim comes to the rescue
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Conspiracy uncovered
Dominic Helps If you’re in any doubt about what constitutes collusive tendering, the Office of Fair Trading has just published a decision that makes it absolutely clear
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It’s a long, long road
Tony Bingham Those canny Irish have put their £4bn roadbuilding programme on hold until they see what happens to the English experiment with design-and-build
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The pensions black hole
Patrick Kennedy and Caoimhe O’Neill If you sign a contract with a firm that has an underfunded final salary pension scheme, it could drag you into the mire too
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This month Legal Aid
Our experts explain the ins and outs of building insurance, outline the many ways an expert QS can resolve wrangles over costs, and look at who pays when a public sector client clashes with a private utility company over delays
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Comment
You animals..
Welcome to Building’s annual league table of the 100 biggest UK contracting and housebuilding giants, ranked by turnover, pre-tax profit, operating margin and more besides.
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Comment
You are the weakest link
NHS Estates' Procure 21 is a model of how to run a modern supply-chain. Unfortunately, a system is only as good as the firms that operate it. Take this outfit for example …
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The battle of Twickenham
The funny, bitter, heartwarming tale of six men who came together to work on a London pub and found themselves transformed into a band of brothers …
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Contract killing
Nobody will be in the least critical of Montpellier’s decision to walk away from Oxford University’s medical research centre. Over the past few months, animal rights activists have subjected management, shareholders, staff and their families to vile intimidation, vandalism and fraud.
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First things last
Why did the cost of the Scottish parliament rise from £40m to more than £400m? Simple. Builders were asked to start work before the designs had been settled
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Rethinking arbitration
The unmitigated success of adjudication leads us logically to reassess the potential of a streamlined version of arbitration to deal with more complex cases
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Comment
Beware your friends
If two firms snuggle up, and then one finds that the other is (metaphorically) picking its pockets, can it get a judge to intervene? The Court of Appeal had this to say …