Board Minutes - 29 November 2001

Board Minutes - 29 November 2001 (31/01/2002)

1. Apologies for Absence

Apologies had been received from Marco Goldschmied, John Wright and Colin Smith.

2. Declarations of Interest

Soo Ware identified that she was actively involved in teaching Part III.

3. Minutes

The minutes of the meeting held on 30 August 2001, with a correction being made to item 5 to show that Larry Rolland had also been present at the meeting in Edinburgh, were approved.

4. Matters Arising from the Minute and Action Points

These were noted.

5. Chairwoman’s Report

The Chairwoman referred to the successful open evening held the night before. She and Board members who had been present joined in thanking staff for having done an excellent job.

The Chairwoman reported that she had attended, along with Owen Luder and Robin Vaughan, the Architects Council of Europe meeting in Vienna. She had chaired a meeting with SCHOSA to discuss the Market Research and criteria. She and the Chief Executive had met the Minister responsible for architecture in Scotland, Mr Alan Wilson. She had attended the Stirling Award presentation in the British Museum, having undertaken work as part of the team that judged the competition in Scotland. Finally, she reported that she had attended a meeting of the United Kingdom Inter Professional Group.

6. Chief Executive/Registrar’s Report

Robin Vaughan reported that training sessions, with RIBA, had been held for the validation panel, and that ARB had carried out training for its Investigators. He reported that he had attended the Advisory Committee on Education and Training in Brussels. That meeting had looked at a range of Spanish diplomas looking for acceptance under the European Directive. He reported a further successful title prosecution case had taken place and that he had been on BBC Radio Manchester talking about the work of the Board on a consumer programme. He reported that the analysis of validation reports that the Board had asked be done for it was being carried out by Mr Alan Nesbit. He reported that new versions of Windows and updating of the database, to better enable the operation of the Register, had taken place.

7. Honorary Treasurers Report

The Honorary Treasurer reported that he was expecting an excess of income over expenditure of about £50,000 by the year end. There was further work to be done before the year end which might impact upon this figure. A full report would be brought to the Board in March.

8. Movements in Register

Robin Vaughan introduced the paper. The Board noted that the current number of registrants was 30,618. The Chief Executive was asked to consider whether packs of registration materials could always go to individual students at their home addresses rather than being circulated to them by their university. There were some difficulties in this relating to data protection issues and movement of students but the Chief Executive agreed to look into it.

9. Professional Indemnity Insurance (PII)

The Chief Executive introduced the paper and drew the Board’s attention to further responses that had just been received from RIBA (Tim Gough) and RIAS (Sebastian Tombs) which had been tabled. He also drew the Board’s attention to the additional information that had been circulated with regard to anticipated new premium levels.

The Chairwoman suggested that the best way of dealing with the paper, together with the correspondence from consultees, including the copies of the ones received earlier, was for there to be a systematic discussion of issues involved. Any further revisions proposed to the Guidelines, the Code or the Certificate of Compliance needed to be considered in the light of the consultation and recommendations from the Board’s insurance advisers.

The Chief Executive indicated that the consultation had shown that other professions were more proactive in terms of monitoring PII than was proposed in the paper, which recommended that a system of self certification should prevail unless and until it became apparent that such a system was not working. He went on to explain how the levels of indemnity proposed had been arrived at and outlined the likely implications for premium rises if they were adopted. Whilst Board members had some sympathy over the rise in premiums and the burden it might place on certain architects it nevertheless felt that this was such a fundamental public interest issue that the suggested levels of indemnity should be adopted.

Although it was suggested that the proposed levels of indemnity in the paper might not be sufficient to meet all possible claims it was agreed to leave them as they were, but to warn registrants they could be revisited in the future. The Board agreed amendments to improve wording for run off cover, the position of employees (particularly in the light of the Babb case) and those architects who work overseas.

The documents before the Board having been agreed, subject to the above amendments, it was decided they be sent out in December to all registrants with the retention fee demand. The Chief Executive was asked to report back to the Board at its May meeting on feedback and responses to the Board’s decision and to give an initial indication of how the profession were managing the process, particularly with regard to the Certificate of Compliance.

10. Part III

i. The Board considered the criteria it had requested for registration at Part III. Several Board members expressed the view that more work needed to be done on the criteria. Dr Jon Levett, the Head of Education, would continue to work with colleagues and members of the Board and experts in the field to refine the work.

Additionally it was noted that a working party would be meeting early in the New Year to review the criteria being piloted for Parts I and II. The Board decided that the working party should be asked also to take on board the work done in relation to Part III so that should adjustments be needed to Parts I and II, in relation to Part III, they could be made. It was agreed that Board members with comments should write to Dr. Levett before 17 January. The criteria would be brought back to the Board at its March meeting and if approved would then be consulted on.

The Chairwoman reported that the current piloting of Parts I and II by Visiting Boards was proving onerous for them. At the suggestion of the Chairman of the Validation Advisory Group the Chairwoman had agreed to the proposal that the Board appoint consultants, one of whom would join the Visiting Boards to universities. It would be the duty of the consultant to report back on the piloting of the criteria, thus sparing members of the Visiting Board that work. This was agreed to by the Board.

ii. Dr Levett gave the Board an update on the work being done by Queens University Belfast in relation to Part III issues. Dr Levett said that research was unlikely to be ready until March 2002 at the earliest. The Board expressed its disappointment that the research was not, as had originally been promised, available by the end of 2001. It instructed Dr. Levett to liase with Queens University Belfast to ensure that the project was completed by its March meeting.

11. ACE Assembly

The Board reviewed the report written by the Chief Executive on the recent ACE Assembly meeting and heard a further report from the Chairwoman. The Conference had been an interesting one, dealing with a range of professional and regulatory issues. In particular the ACE task force paper on “Competition Policy and Professional Practice of Architecture”, which was being re-written from the perspective of consumers, was of interest to the Board. The Chief Executive was asked to distribute it to members of the Board. There was discussion on continuing professional development and its emergence on the ACE agenda. It was agreed that once the ACE paper was formulated it would be useful for it to go to the Education and Practice Advisory Group to assist the Board in its work on Continuing Professional Development which was in the Business Plan for 2002.

12. Five Year Business Plan

The Five Year Plan was approved. The Board agreed to the proposal that it should be kept flexible and that where opportunities arose to bring actions forward then that should be done under the supervision of the Finance and Establishment Committee.