An Engine for Change - A Chronicle of the Engineering Council

ANNEX H 211In what respects is the relationship Poor?Not surprisingly, given the balance of the Registrants, it is still dominated by many CharteredEngineer interests which prevent it from successfully rebalancing the Register and so drivingup Registrant numbers across the board, especially in the Incorporated Engineer andEngineering Technician sections of the Register.Compared with five years ago, is the relationship better, about the same, or worse?Institution of Electrical EngineersRelationship between the IEE and the Engineering Council:IEE has constantly tried to support the Engineering Council, although its interests and thoseof the Council have, on occasion, appeared to diverge.Relationship has been good in that:(a)(b)(c)Alan Rudge, Brian Manley and John Williams put in a tremendous amount of work indrafting the various documents and underpinning the relaunch of the EngineeringCouncil in 1996.There has been considerable interaction/dialogue between the Secretary/ChiefExecutive of the IEE and the Director General of the Engineering Council.It has proved possible to make submissions from the Engineering Council toGovernment, based on collaborative activity among a number of Institutions; IEE hasbeen able to contribute at least as much as other Institutions.Relationship has been poor in that:(a)(b)(c)(d)In a number of instances the Engineering Council has appeared to enter into“competition” with the Institutions for which it was supposed to be the federal body.Examples are:(i) prestige lectures arranges by ECROs;(ii) establishment of an Industrial Affiliate scheme;(iii) involvement in CPD when in fact the activity, of necessity, has to be based inthe Institution.SARTOR-3, while excellent in intention, is a bureaucratic and public relationsnightmare. Matching Sections give the Institutions an impossible workload and willensure that relatively few engineers join the Institutions or register with theEngineering Council in future. In many ways SARTOR-3 represents an “own goal”directed by the Engineering Council and connived in by the Institutions’representatives on the Working Party.There is an “other worldliness” about some Engineering Council policies and the staffwho promote them.There is a feeling that the Engineering Council sometimes seems to delight in tryingto thwart IEE interests. This is particularly the case where Bye-law and Charterchanges are concerned.© Engineering Council UK 2004