Opinion – Page 597
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Comment
Who's for excellence?
The government has just updated its guidance to its own staff who are involved in procuring buildings. Here's what it says about risk allocation and project team integration
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CommentAsk the aspidistra
The new construction minister wanted to know about the industry, so he did something rather unusual: he asked it. Here is what it replied
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Comment
A question of currency
This was an appeal by the defendant, Manuel Revert, from a decision of His Honour Judge Hegarty QC delivered on 6 December 2002. The Judge ordered that the claimant, Virani Limited, was entitled to damages which were to be assessed in US dollars. Manuel was a purchaser of cloth, while ...
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A message to kate barker
The Barker review has been set up by the government to examine the issues affecting housing supply. Kate Barker, a Bank of England economist, has been put in charge of this review, which is now in the consultation stage.
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Reality check
It'll never happen. That was the view of some housebuilders in the audience on hearing the lugubrious economist Roger Bootle's storm warning for the UK housing market's future at our Future Homes conference last month.
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Comment
Eat your heart out, J-Lo
We enter a contract like an A-list marriage, expecting it to end in conflict. But is the industry really so confrontational? Or do lawyers just love a good old barney?
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Why are we so stiff?
Takeovers and an over-complex planning system have forced small housebuilders out – and robbed the industry of its ability to respond to changes in demand
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Comment
Fain would I dwell on forms
JCT standard contract forms may be very useful, but are they truly works of literature? As far as copyright law goes, yes – so make sure you remember this
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Comment
Pay and display
If adjudicators do not get their fees, they can't simply withhold their decision. But even if they do, that's not grounds for challenging the decision itself
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Self-inflicted crisis
It is certainly true, as Georgia Elliott-Smith points out (Sitelife supplement, October 2003), that construction is a lot younger and more dynamic than people think – or at least it should be.
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Comment
Jacks of all trades
We run a postgraduate course for construction industry professionals, Interdisciplinary Design for the Built Environment, at Cambridge University, and we tackle the issues raised in the letter “Radical thinking” (10 October, page 36).
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Comment
Be specific
A two-stage procurement strategy for the Chemistry Building for Queen Mary University of London was described as "traditional" (18 July, page 64), presumably in the expectation that readers were familiar with the procedure.
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Comment
A tale of two monarchies
“There is no more miserable human being than one in whom nothing is habitual but indecision,” wrote William James, Henry’s smarter brother, in his Principle Of Psychology.
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Comment
Check the expiry
Tesco was understandably peeved when one of its superstores burned down, and it wanted cash back. But was the claim past its sell-by date?
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CommentCruel and usual treatment
You contractors get stroppy when your subbies fail to deliver, but the culprit is often the dodgy, lazy, time-honoured ways of the good old British building industry
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Defective thinking
What do defects have to do with retentions? Nothing. Zero. Zip. Zilch. Nada. Sweet Fanny Adams. But just you try telling the government that …
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Would you like some more money?
Not only are your labour-only subcontractors entitled to holiday pay, but if your arrangements for giving it to them are unclear, you could end up doling out twice
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Comment
Bye-bye, Bambi
The Be Collaborative contract is another adorable newborn legal fawn taking its first unsteady steps towards the combine harvester of the construction industry