procurement

The Aldous Retentions Protection Bill of 27 April 2018

The Aldous Retentions Protection Bill of 27 April 2018 is now being supported by more than 60 Trade Bodies. As notified by Project Compass previously it was first moved in Parliament in January.  Peter Aldous MP who is moving the bill said of this need for reform:  “This coalition of support shows the urgent need…

Central Government Framework Agreements Survey

Frameworks bedevil SME Design Professionals so please take this opportunity to complete this survey here on Government Framework Agreements to communicate your views and help formulate better policy for SME access & engagement, before the 31st of March deadline. The survey results will be reported on Project Compass in due course. The letter transcribed below sets out the…

Carillion’s Collapse. Let’s learn lessons from this failure.

Carillion’s collapse: Project Compass director Russell Curtis has called in ‘Let’s hope the lessons of Carillion’s failure will be learnt’, (AJ 17 January 2018) for “a more diverse supply chain to avoid another Carillion catastrophe, so we can face a future with a diverse, specialist and varied supply chain, which matches projects with proficiency and project scale…

Project Compass Newsletter December 2017

The Project Compass Newsletter December 2017 highlights some of our activities  over the past 18 months, the publications that have been output, a procurement trends report and our anticipated future activities. Information on our exciting programme and the range of new activities we plan may be of particular interest to all our supporters and site…

Peter Aldous MP’s Jan. 2018 Bill to protect retentions

Peter Aldous MP will introduced a Parliamentary Bill on 9 Jan. 2018 to protect cash retentions in a retention deposit scheme (similar to a tenancy deposit scheme). Project Compass invite you to write to your local MP to express your support for this. This is an important initiative being promoted by the Specialist Engineering Contractors Group…

Call for ‘bottom up’ enablement by regulatory clarity

Following investigations into London’s Garden Bridge nineteen architects have written to the Chair of the GLA Oversight Committee, calling for better ‘bottom up’ enablement of public services through regulatory clarity. “There is now little motivation for design professionals to initiate and nurture projects from inception as almost invariably the original designers will be preclude as the…

Design Contest Portals, by country

Design Contest Portals from thirty three European countries that announce architectural design contests and competitive opportunities are now published on Project Compass and  on thefulcrum.eu . Open International contests, private contests and opportunities below OJEU thresholds and can also be found through this unique public listing.  Produced as part of the four year programme ‘Competition Culture in Europe’ and issued accompanying…

Heart of the matter: Why architects need a key role in the construction process

(This article was originally published in Planning & Building Control Today). To find an architect lamenting the erosion of the profession’s role within the construction process may elicit from many little more than crocodile tears, and to others, smack of a futile act of self-preservation when faced with challenging financial targets, shrinking capital budgets and…

Procurement reforms at TfL after Hodge Review

After the Thames Garden Bridge debacle and in response to the Hodge Review, on 17 July TfL Board were invited to approve a series of recommendations for governance changes to increase oversight and effectiveness of their procurement activities. This follows on from a number of other previously implemented changes also made public HERE.  Whilst this represents…

Conference on Competition Culture

How can architects, especially the new generation, find out what design contests are announced in Europe? What considerations should they make to decide if they’re going to participate in an architect selection abroad? And what is the chance a winning plan will be built? Architect selections for commissions below EU thresholds are not published on…