Building the Future Commission’s early findings to be revealed in September

Building the Future Commission 

Coming up on the Building the Future commission:

In the coming weeks we will:

• Host our first regional roundtable with our partner Constructing Excellence in the East of England region in mid March
• Convene our first commissioner panel meeting in April
• Host the first roundtable discussion with the Building the Future Young Person’s Advisory Panel 
• Look at the social value toolkit and its potential to help change the low-margin culture of construction
• Interview two big hitters for our housing and planning stream
• Display a selection of ideas on a new Ideas Hub page
• Look at the extent to which local authority planning departments have the skills to develop design codes for our skills and education stream

In the past few weeks we have

• Examined whether the qualifications landscape needs to change and assess whether more flexibility is needed for our education and skills stream
• Assessed a new model of procurement used by the Ministry of Defence for the project delivery and digital stream
• Looked at models of flexible working in the industry for the workplace, culture and leadership stream
• Looked at plans for one of thelargest planned timber housing developments and lessons it could offer in how to secure community support for relatively high density schemes in the parts of the country that tend to oppose development for our net zero and housing and planning streams.
• Invited ideas for submissions on how to improve the built environment through our online form

About the commission

The Building the Future Commission is a year-long project, launched to mark Building’s 180^th  anniversary, to assess potential solutions and radical new ways of thinking to improve the built environment.

The major project’s work will be guided by a panel of 19 major figures who have signed up to help guide the commission’s work culminatuing  culminate in a report published at the end of the year.

The commissioner include figures from the world of contracting, housing development, architecture, policy-making, skills, design, place-making, infrastructure, consultancy and legal.

The commissioners include Lord Kerslake, former head of the civil service, Katy Dowding, executive vice president at Skanska, Richard Steer, chair of Gleeds, Lara Oyedele, president of the Chartered Institute of Housing, Mark Wild, former boss of Crossrail and chief executive of SGN and Simon Tolson, senior partner at Fenwick Elliott. See the full list here.

The project is looking at proposals for change in eight areas:

• Education and skills
• Housing and planning
• Infrastructure
• Building safety
• Project delivery and digital
• Workplace culture and leadership
• Creating communities

>> Editor’s view: And now for something completely positive - our Building the Future Commission

>> Click here for more about the project and the commissioners

Building the Future will also undertake a countrywide tour of roundtable discussions with experts around the regions as part of a consultation programme in partnership with the regional arms of industry body Constructing Excellence. It will also set up a young person’s advisory panel.

We will also be setting up an ideas hub and we want to hear your views.