ARCHITECTS REGISTRATION BOARD

PROFESSIONAL CONDUCT COMMITTEE

IN THE MATTER OF

MARK HEYES (048562D)

on

15 MAY & 11 DECEMBER 2007

Cliffords Inn Conference Centre
Fetter Lane
London EC4A 1LD

Present:

Chairman: Peter Verdin
PCC Member: Professor Alice Brown
PCC Member: James Cuthbertson

Mr Stephen Battersby appeared as Clerk to the Committee
Mr Jonathan Goodwin appeared on behalf of the Board
Mr Heyes attended the Hearing but was not represented

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DECISION
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Transcribed by Harry Counsell & Co.
Official Court Reporters
Clifford’s Inn, Fetter Lane. London EC4A 1LD
Tel: 0207 269 0370   Fax: 0207 405 9884

CHARGE

The charge made against the defendant is that he is guilty of unacceptable professional conduct in respect of one or more of the following:-

1. he held himself out as a member of RIBA when he was not

2. He made representations to his client that he knew to be misleading and/or inaccurate, regarding the status of specific planning applications

3. He improperly withdrew money from a client account and in doing so failed to preserve the security of his client’s funds and utilised the same for his own benefit

4. He failed to ensure that his personal professional finances were managed prudently

5. He failed to report to the Registrar of the Board, within 28 days, that he had been made the subject of a bankruptcy order

15 May 2007
DECISION

CHAIRMAN:  Mr. Heyes, you have pleaded guilty to the charge of unacceptable professional conduct, and we find you guilty. 
                        The case was put to us by Mr. Goodwin with five sets of particulars.  I do not propose to go through them, but you have admitted all of them.  The two matters which we regard as particularly serious are particulars 2 and 3.  We have heard your explanations as to these matters, as well as to the other matters, but there is no escaping the fact that you have been less than frank with your clients.  With regard to particular number 3, you have been reckless with regard to clients’ money.  We regard these matters as extremely serious.
                        We have spent a long time considering what the appropriate penalty is.  I should tell you that we are considering action which may affect your ability to practice as an architect.  We have heard your explanations and we hope that you are serious about taking steps to improve your administration and your relationship with clients, but we want to be sure about this.  We want to be certain that you will take steps which will demonstrate responsibility and leadership which will engender public confidence and trust, which at the minute we must suspect is missing. 
                        What we are proposing to do is adjourn this case; we are not making any decision, we have made a finding of guilt but we are not making any decision as to penalty, we are going to adjourn it until the week starting 10 December.  We want you to come back to us then, and we expect you to be able to show to us at that stage that you have in place a quality management system in your office which can be externally audited.  If I may suggest, you should go to the RIBA, you should go in particular to the regional organisation of the RIBA and obtain advice and help from them and they will show you how to do this.  But I stress, it must be capable of an external audit, the quality system that you put in place.  That must be verifiable and it must show that it will guard against what has happened in the past and that you will be made aware of any occurrence which is taking place in the practice which is a risk to the client. 
                        Secondly, so far as clients’ money is concerned, it is extremely serious for an architect to fail to safeguard clients’ money.  Standard 7 of the Code of Conduct, which I am sure you have read, sets it out in great detail.  When you come back to us we expect you to be able to demonstrate to us that you have in place effective systems which will ensure that you comply with Standard 7.  If I may say so, the best way to ensure that that is so is to have an account which is clearly designated as a client account and that there are proper procedures in place to ensure that money is only taken from that account for clients’ purposes.  This may involve two signatures on the cheques.  There are ways of doing that. 
                        So we are going to adjourn this.  We are not making any decision as to penalty, but I hope that I have made it clear to you how serious we regard what has taken place, particularly with regard to the planning consent and to clients’ money. 
                        Before 10 December, two weeks before that, we would expect you to have sent to the office of ARB a detailed statement setting out how you have complied with our request.  You will get a letter in due course from the office giving you details of this decision, but I want you to be well aware that your future still lies in the balance.  We hope that we can place some reliance on the assurances you have given us today and that those can be implemented in a degree which will satisfy us. 
                        Thank you very much. 

11 December 2007
DECISION

CHAIRMAN:  Mr Heyes, as I said when we started this morning, we do regard these matters as extremely serious and in particular the failure to ensure that your own personal and professional finances were managed properly and the improper withdrawing of money from clients’ account, and we adjourned this case to give you the opportunity to try to introduce some quality management into your practice and we are pleased to see that you have made steps in that direction.  We just hope that that will carry on.
                   One of the things that has struck us is this: that you did get in touch with your regional organisation of RIBA and then you got in touch with the head office.  We would hope that now you have realised that matters can be improved by good quality control you might yourself become an ambassador for this.  There are countless other practices who are struggling, no doubt with the same problems, and it would be very helpful for them to see someone like yourself, who has come up against the wall, who has at least made some attempts to put things right.  It is not for us to say but we would hope that perhaps you might get involved in the local organisation, you might try to get co-opted onto appropriate committees, you might even stand for election and you might, as I say, become a bit of an ambassador for proper quality control in offices.  Because one the things we see here so often is how small practices do struggle, they have got to establish a balance, they cannot be overwhelmed with paper because then they lose the main point of the exercise and it would, I am sure, be helpful for them to see and speak to somebody like yourself, who has at least made some attempt to put these things right, and we hope that that will continue.
                   However, we have a duty to the public and a complaint was made in this case which we cannot ignore.  We have looked at the way in which we should deal with it by way of penalty and in the circumstances we consider that the appropriate penalty to be imposed is that of a reprimand and you are so reprimanded for what you have done, but we are hoping in future things will go well for you.
                   Thank you very much.