Search Results for: one public sector

June 3, 2016

Uncertainty about the consequences of Brexit in construction sector ⁰

by Mark Eltringham • Environment, News, Property

Uncertainty about the consequences of a possible UK vote to leave the EU is having an adverse effect on the country’s construction pipeline, according to the Markit/CPS survey of activity in the market. According to the study, new building orders declined during May for the first time in three years although at 51.2, the index remains above the neutral 50 threshold which indicates that the trend remains positive. The May study specifically asked respondents how their work had been affected by the Brexit vote with one third saying it had had a negative effect. Meanwhile, an April study from CBRE found that demand for office space in London had remained robust through the first quarter despite fears that uncertainty about the market and the wider economy related to the referendum would dampen demand. Meanwhile, a new survey from the IEMA claims that two-thirds of members believe environmental issues will be given lower priority if the UK leaves the EU.

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May 9, 2016

Public neither knows nor cares about the coming era of smart cities ⁰

by Mark Eltringham • Cities, News, Technology

The smart city is the poster child for the new era of immersive digital living, but the British public remains ‘clueless or indifferent’ about the nature of smart cities and what they will mean for their lives, according to a new report entitled: Smart Cities – Time to involve the people published by the Institution of Engineering and Technology. The report claims that only 18 per cent of the British public has heard of a ‘smart city’ and many are unaware that city-wide technologies could improve the quality of life in urban areas. One third of respondents were unable to select the correct definition of a smart city from a list of options. Eight per cent of respondents opted for “a city that has a higher than average proportion of universities and colleges and aims to attract the most intellectual”. And a further five per cent saw it as “a city that has a strict cleaning regime for its buildings, roads and public places”.

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April 22, 2016

LEED certified green buildings in Canada reach a significant milestone ⁰

by Sara Bean • Environment, Facilities management, News, Property, Workplace design

LEED certified buildings in Canada have led to a cumulative reduction of over one million tonnes of CO2e in greenhouse gas emissions – the equivalent of taking 238,377 cars off the road for a year. Along with this milestone the Canada Green Building Council (CaGBC) announced that in the first quarter of 2016 it certified the 1000th LEED Gold project in Canada. LEED Gold, the second most rigorous level of certification, now makes up 38 per cent of all LEED certified projects in Canada – the highest percentage of all levels. This is evidence of the industry’s enhanced capability to achieve higher levels of building performance. Among the most notable projects that earned LEED certification in the first quarter of this year was the certified LEED Platinum TELUS Garden Office Tower in Vancouver, BC, a one million square foot development in the heart of downtown Vancouver that features one of Vancouver’s largest solar panel collections on the office’s rooftop.

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February 18, 2016

The UK public sector workplace is disempowered and can’t cope with change ⁰

by Mark Eltringham • Flexible working, News, Workplace

A new report claims that the typical public sector workplace in the UK is dysfunctional on a number of levels. That is not the conclusion of some right wing think tank, but instead comes from Civica’s Invigorating the Public Sector Revolution report, commissioned in partnership with Society of Local Authority Chief Executives and Senior Managers (SOLACE). Based on a survey of 276 senior and middle management staff, a mere 7 percent of respondents said that the public sector offered an empowering working culture and just 25 percent believe their management teams have the skills and attitudes to lead the organisation over the next ten years. Of particular concern was the ability of organisations to cope with change. Just under half (47 percent) of those surveyed believe their leadership team lacks the management skills needed for ‘a period of massive and accelerating change’.

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November 2, 2015

Insight Briefing: the growth of agile workplaces in the UK public sector ⁰

by Mark Eltringham • Flexible working, Insight Briefings, Premium Content, Public Sector, Workplace design

The process of transforming the UK’s public sector estate may have begun under the last Labour administration but it’s fair to say that change really began to kick in as a consequence of the austerity programme initiated by the current administration. Central Government departments and local authorities had already started exploring new ways of owning and occupying their property in the same way as their private sector contemporaries. Now they were incentivised to respond to an administration that was not only prepared to cut their budgets but was introducing frameworks and legislation that encouraged them to innovate and pioneer a new generation of agile workplaces. In our first Insight Briefing, produced in partnership with Connection, we look at how these forces for change have catalysed a new approach and challenged the idea that innovation in workplace design and management is primarily the preserve of the private sector.

July 29, 2015

Public sector lagging behind in use of technology and flexible working

by Mark Eltringham • Flexible working, News, Public Sector, Technology

As we reported last week, the UK public sector is embracing some interesting new ideas in the way it uses real estate, especially its commitment to get rid of some of it by adopting flexible working and shared space. However, it’s one thing looking to use space in more flexible ways but without the technological infrastructure, it’s hard to see how they will be able to achieve as much as they could. It is in this regard that they are lagging behind their contemporaries in the private sector, according to a new report from O2 and YouGov. While the report, Redefining selling, serving and working, offers up the usual appeals for us all to make more use of the sorts of things O2 wants us to buy, there is plenty of interesting detail to tease out once the pinch of salt has been applied, not least how business practices and the way people use technology vary across sectors.

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July 24, 2015

Groundbreaking public sector estate scheme rolled out nationwide

by Mark Eltringham • Facilities management, News, Property, Public Sector

We’ve reported previously on the Government’s One Public Sector Estate scheme, which encourages local authorities to find ways to share office space and find other ways of divesting buildings as well as freeing up land for development. Over the past two years there has been a phased rollout of the scheme to 32 councils. Now the Cabinet Office and the Local Government Association claim they have gauged the success of the first two phases and are confident the scheme can be expanded nationwide. Their announcement suggests that the 32 councils who are currently on the programme own 28 percent of council land and property assets in England and have applied the ideas of the One Public Sector Estate Initiative to free up land for around 9,000 homes and create some 20,000 new jobs. The councils involved are also expected to raise £129 million in capital receipts from land sales and cut running costs by £77 million over 5 years.

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June 25, 2015

The healthy workplace is now a matter of public policy in the UK

by Mark Eltringham • Legal news, News, Wellbeing, Workplace design

Promoting a culture that improves the health and wellbeing of employees is good management practice and leads to a healthy and productive workplace, according to the Governmental body charged with shaping policy and offering advice on health related matters in the UK. The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), part of the Department of Health, has published a new set of guidelines on the issue and called on employers to do more to address the challenge of creating a productive and healthy workplace. According to NICE, workplace health is a significant public health issue with more than a million working people in the UK experiencing a work-related illness each year, leading to around 27 million lost working days and costing the economy an estimated £13.4 billion.

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May 28, 2015

Public sector lacks skills and confidence to buy more from smaller companies

by Mark Eltringham • Facilities management, News, Public Sector

A new survey from techUK, the trade association that represents technology companies in the UK, claims that while civil servants see IT as key to delivering their mission, they don’t think their departments have the right skills and culture to enable digital transformation of public services. This extends to the way goods and services are procured with particular consequences for smaller suppliers. Of the 929 Civil Servants surveyed for the study, less than 1 percent of respondents see IT as an overhead, while over three quarters believe it to be a necessity. However, there remain significant barriers to technology adoption. Over three quarter (68 percent) claim that having the right skills internally is critical to improving the procurement process; but only 20 percent agree their department has the skills and capabilities to manage suppliers.

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March 11, 2015

How a big, stupid idea can be more attractive than a small, effective one

by Mark Eltringham • Architecture, Comment, Property

We’re going to be hearing a lot of big ideas over the next few weeks. Politicians will be sharing their ‘visions’ with us and letting us know exactly how ‘passionate’ they are about them and anything else Twitter tells them we care about. It’s going to be boring and infuriating, but we only have ourselves to blame. We fret when politicians don’t give us a handy label on which we can rest our hopes or lay the blame, depending on whether we agree with whatever the big idea is or not. Of course, David Cameron’s vision of choice when he became Prime Minister in 2010 was The Big Society. I won’t get into the rights and wrongs of that but I think we can all agree that The Big Society has been kicked unceremoniously into The Long Grass and we won’t be hearing much about it in the build up to this year’s General Election. Nor will we be hearing much about another of David Cameron’s pet projects even though that has actually gone on to be something of a success.

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March 2, 2015

Government makes public sector work more attractive and accessible for SMEs

by Mark Eltringham • Facilities management, News, Public Sector

The latest changes to public procurement regulations in the UK have now come into force, which the Cabinet Office claims will make it easier for businesses to win government and other public sector contracts. The new regulations have a particular focus on making work more accessible and attractive for small and medium sized enterprises. The key reforms which came into force on the 26 February include the abolition of a pre-qualification stage for procurements below the EU thresholds and a requirement to take account of guidance on qualitative selection issued by the Cabinet Office for above EU threshold; the requirement for contracting authorities to insert provisions in all public contracts to ensure prompt payment through the supply chain; and the requirement to advertise as many public sector opportunities in one place (Contracts Finder), and to publish award notices for contracts and call-offs from framework agreements.

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November 24, 2014

Arup and UCL report offers up lessons from smart cities pioneers

by Mark Eltringham • Cities, Knowledge, News, Technology

A new report published by engineering and design consultancy Arup and University College London claims that the pioneers of the smart cities movement need to take a more strategic approach to ensure that their spending on IT infrastructure is effective in meeting their objectives. The report Delivering the Smart City: Governing Cities in the Digital Age is based on research of eight cities including London and Bristol in the UK alongside a number of other prominent global cities such as Chicago, Barcelona, Stockholm and Hong Kong. The report found that the cities spend an average of 6 percent of their expenditure on IT services and technology, which amounts to approximately £23 million per city across the study and is roughly equivalent to the amount budgeted in the financial services sector worldwide. While the authors welcome this as a sign that tech spending is taken seriously, they also claim that more could be done to target this spending effectively and tailored to the specific needs of each city depending on factors such as its ‘ecosystem’, culture and governance. It believes that the lessons from this are appropriate to all cities, not just those already pursuing a smart agenda.