property + asset management

Engineers must be held accountable

May 22, 2014

OPINION: A hard line needs to be taken with inferior engineering work, writes Dr Andrew Cleland, the chief executive of the Institution of Professional Engineers New Zealand (IPENZ).
Those whose engineering work is proven to be negligent or incompetent should no longer be able to undertake engineering activities that put the public at future risk. There is a growing public consensus of the need for change in the aftermath of the Canterbury earthquakes.
Building and Construction Minister Nick Smith has stated he wishes to reform the regulatory system for engineers to world-class standard, including ensuring that those whose practice is poor are sufficiently held to account and penalised.
The Institution of Professional Engineers New Zealand (IPENZ) supports his intention and is working with him to achieve that goal. Engineers take their responsibility to safeguard health and safety very seriously.
In general, the public has a high level of confidence in engineering, be it for a vehicle, aeroplane, water supply, communications system, power supply, appliance, building or other. Failures are rare throughout the developed world.
Removing the right to practise requires a new occupational regulatory system. In such a system the public safety-critical work would be restricted to a class of person of proven competence (eg, a chartered professional engineer). Then if the registration was removed as the result of an investigative and disciplinary process the right to practise (except under direct supervision) would be lost.
New Zealand has not had such a system for many decades, if ever – perhaps the nation’s lawmakers have become complacent because, generally, engineering works perform exceptionally well in this country, as most did in the Canterbury earthquakes.
IPENZ first recommended a regulatory change for commercial structural engineering back in 2003.
The chartered professional engineer statutory regime for which IPENZ is the registration authority acts solely to allow those registered to use the protected title of chartered professional engineer.
This works well in situations where informing consumers of good quality engineers is sufficient public protection, but falls short of restricting those who can perform safety-critical work.
Many engineers believe strongly in the ethos of professionalism and choose to join the professional body, IPENZ, in which they voluntarily submit themselves to the enforcement of professional standards on all members by their peers.
For members, their standing among their peers is important to them, and, thus, if subject to a complaint most choose to have peers to stand in judgment on their performance. Removal from membership is a loss of standing among one’s professional peers. But, membership is voluntary and a member can resign at any time.
Such resignation leads to a loss of standing.
In the absence of a regulatory system restricting the right to practise, and where the engineer has chosen not to register as a chartered professional engineer, those who are concerned about the performance of an engineer have often had no choice but to turn to IPENZ as a professional body.
In recent times membership rules have been asked to achieve things in the public interest that they cannot do.
Those with valid complaints are often disappointed to find the membership rules do not have the capability to restrict right to practise.
The public of New Zealand are now demanding better.
This year New Zealand has a unique opportunity to learn from our international peers.
IPENZ will host the International Engineering Alliance, the multi- national body for benchmarking of competence standards, in Wellington from June 9 to 13.

– The Press