A Hiatus in the Construction Industry?

by bregs blog admin team

Last Friday University College Cork (UCC) sought tenders for a design team for a new Student Hub envisaged to support learning and employability skills for students. The Hub is part of the university’s plan to “be largely self-funding within five years, saving the Irish taxpayer millions of euro a year” Irish Examiner 25/05/13

The tender specifies that the project architect “will have overall responsibility for full compliance with the New Building Control (Amendment) Regulations 2013 which will come into effect on the 1st of March 2014… and will act as the Assigned Certifier for the project duration”. This seems prudent on UCC’s part, after-all projects that commence on site from the 1st March next year must comply with the new regulations.

The problem is revisions to the regulations are still ongoing and the role of the Certifier is as yet unknown. Once the regulations and the roles are confirmed, more time will be needed for new contracts to be written, for insurers to confirm they will indemnity the Certifier, for professionals to up-skill for their new role and for appointments to be agreed.

The public sector is not ready either, as it emerges that the promised IT systems will not be in place for the 1st March. Yet no additional resources will be be provided in the understaffed Building Control Authorities to deal with vast amounts of paperwork required under the new regulations

It seems inevitable that the UCC project will be on hold until all of this can be sorted out. The situation is even graver for projects already underway and due to start on site from 1st March. Existing contracts will need to be unraveled and new ones formed. All in time for March 1st, or virtually no new projects will start on site.

Will this mean a hiatus in the construction industry, just as it beginning to get back on its feet?

For a more detailed analysis of the expected delays in the Construction Industry, see our report here