I was (and indeed still practice as) a Chartered Quantity Surveyor and Chartered Arbitrator operating in engineering and construction in the UK and internationally.
Bob Davis
Following the TCC’s decision in ISG Construction Ltd v Seevic College [2014] EWHC 4007 (TCC) it did not take long for the ingenuity of practitioners to come to the fore in seeking to find a solution to what could be perceived as one contracting party gaining an unfair advantage as a result of the other’s failure to operate the payment provisions contained in a contract.
I am please to commence this edition of the Society’s newsletter by recording my continued admiration and thanks for the efforts of our editor Lucy Garrett supported by my fellow executive board member Glenn Godfrey in producing a newsletter which continues to improve and is, I am sure members will agree, a most welcome and usable addition to the information which lands in our inboxes.
Adjudication is working. That is the general consensus of the industry and the process is serving users well. Any quick fire system for solving problems will throw up anomolies and the odd bad decision however I ask what process of dispute resolution is deviod of such problems. I can’t help notice that some commentaries that I see seek to adopt a negative view on the process. The easy target I find in such commentaries is to pour scorn on the hapless Adjudicator.
Following the continued success of our annual conference I am pleased to announce that Martin Potter together with suitable supporting staff will again organise this year's conference to be held on 15 November 2007. Our theme this year will be International Adjudication incorporating the role of DRB's and DAB's. Preliminary details have already been published and I urge memberrs to record the date in their diaries.
On 16 November 2006, perhaps by way of a passing shot or maybe simply the final act of the outgoing chairman, Guy Cottam congratulated me in taking over the reins of the Society for the next two years. In doing so he reminded me that the next edition of the Newsetter was imminent and one of the many tasks before me was to prepare this piece.
For what will be my first note of many I have considered three matters.
(i) the fifth annual conference
(ii) the newly elected committee
(iii) the outgoing chairman
Time flies as I approach the end of my first year in the chair of the Society. It is a year in which much has happened and the work behind the scenes carried out on behalf of the Society continues via the tireless efforts of dedicated individuals at executive and regional level.
To that end you will have received notice from our Secretary of our forthcoming AGM which as ever will be held during our Annual Conference to be held on 15 November 2007 and the Annual Report of the Society will be presented to members at that time.
A belated and happy new year to all members, I hope the year will be a prosperous one despite the continued doom and gloom that is reported in the media.
The concept of Adjudication in its present guise is 10 years old and heading for its teenage years. I am sure everyone will agree that what we have now it a vastly different animal to what we all anticipated we were about to get. Many learned columnists were advising that this new creature of contract i.e. the Adjudicator was about to step into the shoes of the Contract Administrator, Engineer and Quantity Surveyors. In the beginning I suspect that is exactly what happened.
Summer is upon us and change is afoot, for example and much to the despair of Martin Potter, England has a new cricket captain who hopes to rally his team and bring about a new dawn. Similarly the Construction Industry and in particular the dispute world is about to encounter change. After 10 years we are ever closer to an update to the Housing Grants Act.