British Institute of Interior Design

The new All-Party Parliamentary Group for Excellence in the Built Environment was formally launched at the Construction Industry Council's annual summer reception, held at the Institution of Civil Engineers on 7 July.

The Chairman of the new Group, Tony Baldry MP - a former Department of the Environment Minister responsible for construction - announced that the Group's first act will be to establish a Commission on Excellence in the Built Environment, which will comprise Members of both Houses of Parliament, leaders of the professions and industry groups in membership of CIC and several independent contributors who will, he said, "challenge ideas, thinking and Expectation from outside the Parliamentary and construction boxes".

Launching the new Group and Commission, Mr Baldry said that "given the country's national indebtedness, the Government understandably is going to have concerns about affordability of building projects and clearly is going to want to look at what can be done to achieve best value for money". For this reason, he indicated that the first enquiry for the Commission would be to look at how "on the one hand, we ensure good value for money, for public spending and public procurement of construction, and on the other hand, seek to achieve Excellence in the Built Environment".

The All-Party Parliamentary Group's primary remit will be to present an holistic, cohesive, overarching view from all sectors of demand, planning, designing, constructing, managing and maintaining the built environment and its external landscape. It will seek to work closely with other All-Party groups representing particular sectors of the built environment, such as architecture & planning, climate change, infrastructure, building, highway maintenance and gas safety.

The principal guest at the event was Mark Prisk MP - the Coalition Government's Minister of State for Business and the CIC's host was the Rt Hon Nick Raynsford, also a former Minister responsible for construction.

The reception provided an opportunity for many new MPs from each of the main political parties to meet leaders of the built environment professions.

At the Reception, the CIC Chief Executive, Graham Watts said”we communicated with many prospective parliamentary candidates in the run-up to the Election in promoting our manifesto for the Built Environment. It was very evident that none really understood the extent and interconnectivity of the built environment and industries. They talked about the housing industry or landscape or civil engineering as if they were entirely isolated from one another and that fragmentation is the industry's weakness. The new Group is an attempt to engage parliamentarians and other serious commentators in looking at the big strategic issues, affecting the built environment, which impact upon the lives of every constituent."