In the period since the publication of the Hackitt report our industry strived for a method of joining the dots together to ensure the end client actually gets what was asked for and needed, actually this is more difficult than it appears as there are those in the industry that are outside of the SP207 body installing evacuation systems that then cannot be certified and what should really be happening is that only those on the 207 register are invited for such works thus no more supply and commission works for these “systems of last resort” should be considered as acceptable, only those certified under the BAFE scheme should be involved.
Now that “The Gateway” process has superseded the Golden Thread, the expectation now is that a single direction of travel with scrutiny and monitoring of the 3 stages from design through product and then install are all interconnected so that it is not possible to move from stage 1 to stage 2 without formal sign off and this negates change or the dreaded “value engineering” from derailing the project and the compliance requirements with inferior or unsuitable product and then onto stage 3 delivery of the project exactly as was intended.
Only by truly adopting this complete game changer within the industry can we hope to drag ourselves of minimum cost wins and thus a race to the bottom commences for those bidding such work.
Compliance and full compliance to the client within the standards and codes of practice is all that is required which will in itself require maximum effort and participation by those involved and this will as a result force out those who cannot or will not take the changes seriously.
