The Egan Report of 19986 had a wide effect on the construction industry because it suggested many ways in which knowledge of good practice in design and construction could be more widely disseminated to achieve increased efficiency and also reduce costs, accidents, defects and time for construction. It emphasized that there should be more use of partnering and alliancing. This was supported by the DETRs7 Construction Best Practice Programme; the Government National Audit Offices report on Modernising Construction, January 2001; and the Local Government Task Forces publication Rethinking Construction:
Implementation Guide, August 2001, which gave over one hundred recommendations to local authorities for better practice in achieving construction.
Although there can be many forms of partnering, in construction it most
often involves a promoter, his designers, and the contractor or contractors for construction. Although the partnership need comprise only a statement of good intent by the parties, it can be more firmly established as a contractual relationship. Each of the contracts entered into by the promoter then contains a clause requiring co-operation with the other parties. Any of the usual forms of contract can be used, dependent on the nature of the work involved and provisions for payment. For some projects the partners may be required to keep their books open for inspection, or cost-reimbursement contracts can be used to provide the necessary information.
The partners and their staffs work together as a group to identify better
methods of working and overcoming potential problems and to resolve these
to the benefit of the project and the partners. Specific objectives may be set and incentives applied to encourage co-operation of the partners, perhaps by means of risk sharing and bonus or damages payments depending on the outcome of the project. It is important to recognize that the partners may change over the time scale of a project and that not all those involved in a project need to be partners.
Partnering may apply to long term alliances where the same teams may
produce a series of works with the intent of improving the product and reducing costs. This could, for example, be for such as repeated roadworks, sewer or water main relaying, or even major works of a similar type. Alternatively partnering can be for single projects in which case project specific objectives may be set.
5This reduces the PSBR (public sector borrowing requirement) i.e. the total amount of government debt which, expressed as proportion of the GDP (gross domestic product), is used as an indicator of a nations economic health just as a persons credit-worthiness is undermined if he falls into too much debt relative to his income.
6Rethinking Construction by Sir John Egan. Report of UK Government Construction Task Force.