2012 firms urged to adopt best practice

The Construction Industry Council (CIC) has expressed its disappointment that only 133 of the 3,000 construction companies that want to work on the Olympics have signed up for the 2012 Construction Commitments.

CIC chief executive Graham Watts, who is a member of the Strategic Forum for Construction, the body behind the commitments, said that the total so far was “not enough”.

Meanwhile, Howard Shiplee, construction director of the Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA), pointed out that more than 3,000 construction firms had registered their interest in working on the Olympics with the ODA.

A large proportion of the firms that have signed up are materials companies. While the Major Contractors Group has signed as a body, among the few individual contractors to have done so are: Costain, Hochtief (UK) Construction, Mace and Ringway.

Sir Robert McAlpine, which is preferred bidder for the Olympic stadium and Laing O’Rourke, which is part of the CLM consortium, were unavailable to comment on why they had not yet signed up.

Commenting on the disparity between the number of those signed up for the commitments and the number of those inter-ested in Olympic work, Shiplee said: “If anyone can make the connection, that would be interesting.”

The Construction Commit-ments were conceived as a way to promote the UK as an exemplar of construction best practice in time for the 2012 Olympic Games (CJ, 5 July).

They pull together around 30 to 40 existing areas of best practice and bring them under six broad headings: procurement and integration; client leadership; design quality; commitment to people; sustainability; and health and safety.

Watts said: “It bothers me that 3,000 companies have registered to do Olympic work, but not even 150 of them have signed up for Construction Commitments – the details have been pretty widely disseminated.”

Asked why so few companies had got around to signing up so far, he said: “I don’t think it’s inertia, but a lot of people are too busy doing work to sign the document. I do think it will gather pace.” It can take several weeks to prepare for signing up, he added.

A spokeswoman for HBG, who is yet to join the list, said: “It isn’t a conscious decision not to sign up, it’s something we’re still looking at.“