Industry warns over Strategy for Sustainable Construction targets

Industry figures have warned that targets set in the government’s new Strategy for Sustainable Construction and the Construction Commitments need to be backed firmly by the public sector if they are to be met.

The Strategy, launched by construction minister Baroness Shriti Vadera, draws together targets from different government departments and agencies and places them in a single document. It includes sustainability targets for the first time.

Meanwhile the Public Sector Construction Clients Forum has signed up to new Construction Commitments which pick up from the Olympic Delivery Authority’s 2012 Construction Commitments to set new best practice targets over a four-year cycle.

The Environment Agency is not currently signed up, but talks are understood to be underway.

Vadera said: “We’ve made great progress in the last 10 years but we know that there is quite a significant way to go and today is an opportunity to redouble our efforts,” she added.

But Major Contractors Group chairman John Spanswick said he needed reassurance that the targets would be properly pursued by the public sector.

“I need convincing that you are going to be able to persuade government departments and local authorities to actually put a value on these commitments that many of us are prepared to produce. At the moment I have to say that it is slightly lacking,” he said.

And Rudi Klein warned that without proper monitoring, targets on issues like integrated teams could be missed, as they were under Egan. “It’s great to indulge in euphoria when we are launching a new strategy, but 10 years ago the government launched something called ‘Achieving Excellence In Construction’. That was no different really from the Commitments,” he said.

Meanwhile the UK Green Building Council said the Strategy was “only a first step” and was the “tip of the iceberg” in terms of effort needed.

And the Civil Engineering Contractors Association warned that mandatory guidelines for public sector bodies would be needed to ensure the targets were met.