Opinion – Page 352
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Comment
OFT special: This time it's personal
Even if the OFT has found a firm guilty, they can still nail the directors – with a prison sentence and colossal fine. And individual liability is a growth area
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Comment
Musings from the Tory conference
David Cameron’s rousing finale to this year’s Conservative Party Conference – focused on family, community and country and highlighted health, regeneration, education and housing. The importance for our sectors in focusing on the benefits of investment in infrastructure, and the role of built assets in enabling efficiency, rather than ...
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Comment
Future traders think the tide has turned for house prices
The futures market is now pricing in strong growth in the housing market, with the Halifax index priced to rise by 6% over the coming 12 months and by 12% over 5 years.This is a marked rise in the prices from just a month ago and reflects the uplift in ...
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Comment
Who'll do "a Parsons Brinckerhoff" next?
Contractors are still pondering the implications of Balfour Beatty's canny swoop on American infrastructure firm Parsons Brinckerhoff last month.The almost universal reaction has been one of envy at a deal that takes Balfour up the food chain and further into the white collar world of consulting while strengthening its US ...
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CommentThe G3 summit: How much trouble are we in and how do we get out?
At this point in the business cycle we have at least some idea of what the recession has done to consultants, and how they can regroup and fight back. Three QS leaders comment
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Comment
How do I … fund a claim?
Even if you are reasonably sure of success, funding can be an obstacle to pursuing a claim. Luckily, there are three alternatives to stumping up the cash yourself
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CommentCosting the earth
You may think that, given the importance of a housebuilder’s landbank, there would be a well understood way of valuing it. And you’d be wrong
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Comment
Blame the clients
One aspect of the Office of Fair Trading’s cover-pricing inquiry that seems to have been missed is the effect of clients and their professional advisers
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Comment
Take a cut of future contracts
There may be such a thing as an innocent cover price, if the contractor does not want to bid but does want to show willing. However, cover prices can be used to share the work around and the only reason for that is to keep prices high
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Comment
Doubt its illegality
The 13 roofing contractors that the OFT found guilty of price fixing in 2006 were not engaged in “simple cover pricing”, but bid-rigging
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Comment
Worry about Europe
A key point that was not addressed in the podcast on www.building.co.uk was the future ability of the “guilty” contractors to tender for public works
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Comment
Be ashamed (i)
If a member of the RICS were found guilty of anything “fraudulent” they would be stripped of their MRICS status and would most likely be fired by their employer
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Comment
Be ashamed (ii)
As a registered architect, all I can say is that if I were found guilty of this sort of practice I would be struck off – not given excuses by the government
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Comment
Suspend the fines
Although the process of investigation and the resultant findings were necessary to halt bid-rigging, I among many others will be disappointed by the level of fines imposed by the OFT, which may cripple or close some companies
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Comment
Learn basic morals
Why do the construction companies seem not to understand their own lack of morality?
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Comment
Put your house in order
In a world of short tender periods and poor contract information, clients are expecting contractors to be gamblers
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Comment
Punish the guilty
Cover pricing saves the contractors the cost of tendering and they can agree between themselves who will get the next tender
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CommentThe academy in peril
If you find yourself with a spare hour in Piccadilly, go and see Anish Kapoor at the RA: it’s disturbing, even violent, but it has a lot to say about how art fits into buildings