Opinion – Page 338
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CommentThe little Ceausescus
When it comes to making changes to listed buildings, planners and conservation authorities are often unhelpful, ill-informed, and obstructive to the point of malice
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CommentA cock and ball story
Tony Bingham If your little mistake turns out to be a massive mistake because of my little mistake, can you be made to pay the whole of the bill? Over to the Court of Appeal …
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The job’s in the blag
Guy Guinan As competition for jobs gets tougher, more candidates are embellishing their CVs. But it’s the employer who’ll be for the high jump if one of them subsequently messes up
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The road to recovery
Jeff Brown Here’s some good news for firms that are pursuing claims against insolvent defendants: a new bill should make it easier for you to get your money …
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What problems with housing?
It was good to see some reflection in last week’s issue on the state of housing quality (22 January, page 20)
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These problems with housing
The recent problems with the Homes and Communities Agency’s Kickstart programme highlight an uncomfortable truth: many of the new homes being built in the UK aren’t good enough
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These problems with Kickstart
Homebuyers quite rightly are the best judges of private housing quality
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Return to sender
Last week’s story on Concentra said incorrectly that Durkan Holdings sold its 51% stake in Durkan Pudelek to Gombe Holdings
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Ditch the old buildings …
In response to “Morrell: Older buildings must be torn down” (building.co.uk, 25 January): not only were many sixties and seventies public buildings constructed with minimal resources, they were often planned to government handbooks that specified the maximum internal area that could not under any circumstances be exceeded
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… and new ones, too
Regarding Morrell’s views on older buildings: Immediate postwar construction can be equally shoddy
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Dear Amanda …
Amanda Levete’s 22 January column suggesting a committee of architects be put in charge of planning was discussed by the online community …
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CommentHansom: The meaning of life
As Monty Python so clearly showed, our worlds comprise just a few basic elements: learning, work, sex, war, recreation and wondering what on earth it’s all about anyway. And construction’s got the lot
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CommentA wiser course for busy fools
When times are desperate, there’s a temptation to grab anything that might boost our turnover. The game now should be to prepare for the upturn and increase margins
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CommentBuilding buys a pint: Eckersley O’Callaghan
We’re in the King’s Head in Islington, north London, on the day that Britain officially declared its deepest recession since the thirties over – by a whisker
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CommentBrian Green: This is your new playground
Relying on clients to create demand won’t work any more – construction firms need new, sophisticated business models that tie their profit to places rather than one-off projects
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CommentTube PPP: Mind the gaping hole
A £1.75bn chasm has emerged between what Transport for London is willing to pay to upgrade the Northern line and what Tube Lines is willing to do the work for. Could this be the end of the line for the tube PPP?
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CommentGovernment burglars
As Brian Green points out in his column on drumming up work, the government has pretty much kept the industry in business during the recession
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God damn it, don’t you just feel richer...
When I see the house price indexes rising I can’t stop myself. I have to do a sum that estimates how much richer we are as a nation.Here’s how I do it. I head straight for the Blue Book (a set of the nation’s annual accounts, if you like) and ...
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Will we see the return of mobile classrooms, or can construction firms find a better solution?
In a chat yesterday it was suggested I should make a note of the rapid increase in the number of babies being born and the implications for construction, or not as the case may be.This chimed with me, as I had recently been told that they will need two more ...
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We’re still in recession says CIPS, despite official figures showing construction output growth
Here’s a question I ponder quite a bit. Why do the official figures show that construction grew in the second and third quarters of last year when to everyone else construction has remained mired in the slough of a nasty recession?Puzzling isn’t it. Even more puzzling that the estimates for ...