Call to arms at the ICW

The new president of the Institute of Clerks of Works has called on its 3,000 members to act to help ensure the institute's survival.

Membership of the institute has halved in less than 20 years and new ICW president Colin Barnes said: "This decline must be arrested and reversed."

Barnes said: "The construction industry has changed drastically over the years and continues to evolve to meet the rapidly changing demands of the market place.

"As an institute we have failed to keep pace, preferring to hide behind an illusion of elitism and exclusivity that in an environment of cost-effective management of resources simply cannot be sustained."

Barnes said members of the institute must not continue being "the architects of our own downfall" and called on them to help recruit the 90% of practicing CoWs who are not members of the ICW.

"They do not flock to our doors looking for support, so to survive we must find a way to bring them to us."