Prevention of a UK Civil Engineering Contractor Washout
Comment from John Wilding FInstCES
Vice President of the Institution of Civil Engineering Surveyors
Representing the views of the Institution

German Chancellor, Gerhard Schröder, invited national leaders from Austria, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia, together with the European Commission President, Romano Prodi to Berlin earlier this month for emergency talks on how to tackle the on-going flood crisis across central Europe and to assess the huge cost of the destruction so far.

How much of this income generation will come to the UK civil engineering industry?

The flood bill is estimated to be in tens of billions of pounds and the EU has pledged to release funds to the worst affected countries to help them recover from the devastation left behind from the floods.

Gerhard Schröder, who made the announcement regarding the EU funding pledge, did not give a value for how much money would be released, but it is expected that the recovery aid package will come from unspent funds of the EU Structural Budget and will be spent on repairs to building, infrastructure and, more significantly, flood prevention. Each of the countries affected by the recent floods, and indeed some neighbouring countries, will now be looking at long term investment in flood defence systems. This will involve many complex and large scale engineering projects, particularly for hydraulic engineering specialists, and could potentially offer many UK civil engineering contractors new European business opportunities.

However, the Institution's main concern is that although the UK is a net contributor to the EU pot of cash, British firms will, once again, be omitted from tendering for such damage repair and prevention work in response to a major European natural disaster.

We believe therefore that the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) and the government should make a strong representation to the EU of behalf of UK civil engineering industry to ensure that our contractors and consultants are given an equal opportunity within the European Community to tender for any infrastructure repair or flood defence system work that is to be undertaken in those countries affected with the aid of this EU funding.

For further comment from John Wilding, tel: + 44 (0) 161 272 8200