BESA chief executive officer David Frise
The Association’s Council, whose members are responsible for BESA’s governance and ensuring that it continues to meet the vision and values of its founders, said it was taking this step as part of its ongoing campaign to improve technical and professional standards across the building engineering sector.
The five companies failed to reach the standard required to meet BESA’sCompetence Assessment Standard (CAS) which covers business practices, financial solvency, insurance, health & safety, and technical proficiency. Firms applying to join BESA or remain in membership must meet and continue to meet the standard.
BESA’s process is also aligned with the industry benchmark provided by the Build UK Common Assessment Standardand supports the UK government’s ambition to improve construction standards and protect building users under the Building Safety Act.
“BESA has never been afraid to robustly defend its remit and constitution,” said chief executive officer David Frise. “We do not suspend members lightly but take our wider responsibilities to the industry and its ultimate clients – building occupants – extremely seriously.
“It might seem counterintuitive for a membership body to suspend or reject companies, but membership needs to stand for something. We would always favour quality over quantity, and we now have more companies waiting to join – so sticking to our principles is working.”
Robust
The Association said its current pass rate for the CAS audit i.e. those companies achieving zero non-compliance at audit, was 62%. It said this demonstrated the system was “robust” and that several companies still had work to do to ensure they could meet their legal and ethical responsibilities.
BESA also recently launched a Member Pledge initiative when several of its largest and most prominent members signed an agreement to put professional and technical competence at the heart of their operations and mandate their supply chains to do the same.
Supply chain firms are invited to apply for BESA membership so they can prove their competence and compliance through the technical audit process. Frise said clients had a powerful incentive to specify member firms because the audit meets their own need to demonstrate legal and professional duty of care in procurement.
The audit is carried out by BESCA , a UKAS accredited independent part of the BESA group. It investigates whether prospective and existing members have all the skills necessary to deliver quality, safe work. It includes an on-site technical audit based on check lists linked to latest technical standards so clients, main contractors and the public can have confidence when appointing a BESA member firm.
“BESA members are embracing change because we want to make the industry better,” said Frise. “Our companies are leading our part of the construction industry, rejecting the race to the bottom and working towards our vision of a better industry, one that is competent, compliant and sustainable.”
He added that the Association was not interested in attempts to demonstrate “superficial conformity” but was pushing hard for “real change”.
“We have never been afraid to suspend members who don’t meet our standards,” said Frise. “It is always a last resort as we would much rather work with companies to help them improve, but when it is clear that is not possible, we have demonstrated that we will take the ultimate sanction.”