A couple of months ago, I was invited, as part of a small delegation from the highways sector, to Downing Street, to meet Number 10’s head of policy, Paul Kirby.
The Government, in recognising the importance of public funding for infrastructure, was keen to explore what more could be done to help the sector in supporting economic recovery.
One area which it considered could help was to widen the current remit of Infrastructure UK, not only in publishing pipelines for all major infrastructure programmes such as transport, waste, flood, but all other public sector procurement.
Coincidently, I had already been undertaking some work in support of HMEP (Highway Maintenance Efficiency Programme), gathering better intelligence on the future pipeline for highway maintenance contracts.
This was principally for two purposes.
First, to be able to identify opportunities for potential joint procurement, and second, to identify authorities which might benefit from taking up the standard highway maintenance contract being developed through HMEP.
Some baseline data had already been gathered from a number of independent sources,but this was far from comprehensive or up to date. In discussions with the Government,ADEPT (the Association of Directors of Environment, Economy, Planning and Transport) was asked if it could assist in producing this new pipeline.
Following agreement with HM Treasury regarding the key information required, emails were sent out to all local highway authorities in early April. Over the next few weeks, we had a terrific response and received data from more than 50% of all the highways authorities.
On 20 April, this initial information was published on the HM Treasury website.
Many thanks for all the contributions to date.
The remaining information is still coming in, and we are confident we will get somewhere near to 100%.
The Treasury has agreed to periodically update the pipline page on its site, as and when we have more information.
So what is the context of this work?
The Plan for growth published in the Budget 2011 set out two commitments in relation to publishing pipeline data – to publish the UK’s long-term forward view of projects and programmes, as part of the National Infrastructure Plan 2011, and to publish quarterly,from autumn 2011, a rolling two-year forward programme of construction and infrastructure projects where public funding had been agreed.
The launch of the Government Construction Strategy in July 2011 saw publication of the first estimate for the size of the Government’s forward construction pipeline, which offered indications of spending commitments by the key government spending departments.
This was welcomed by industry as an important first step towards publication of the full pipeline in autumn 2011.
The Government has continued to work with industry representatives to ensure that the first full publication of the Funded construction pipeline meets with the needs of industry, helping secure more efficient delivery of public sector construction projects.
So, what are the benefits of forward visibility?
Working with industry, the Government has identified the following potential benefits of the publication of the Funded construction pipeline:
• better resource allocation
• improved skills /recruitment management
• more stable workforce
• ability to enter into long-term purchase
agreements
• encourage innovation
• early identification of feast/famine situations
(regional, sector, specialism/procurement
or delivery)
• more effective response to procurement
• create opportunities for collaborative procurement
• ability for suppliers to make early business
decisions
• foster environment for greater early supply
chain engagement
• support the development of integrated
teams
• early identification of project pitfalls
• support improved industry forecasting
• encourage as best practice for non-public
sector clients
• engaging with SMEs.
With regard the pipeline for local authority highway maintenance contracts, there are a number of issues still to be addressed about how this, in terms of information, will be managed and kept up to date. Further discussions are scheduled with HM Treasury to clarify these issues.
However, this is an important step in trying to improve the management of £5bn a year pipeline of highway maintenance work for the benefit of UK Plc.
