An Engine for Change - A Chronicle of the Engineering Council

58A CHRONICLE OF THE ENGINEERING COUNCILDespite all this the Chairman and the Director General patiently went over the same issuestime after time; by the end of Sir William’s three-year term it seemed that relations betweenthe EngC and the Institutions had improved and worked reasonably well. As Sir Williamstated in the Annual report for 1989, “UK Engineering is an important element in our nationallife and we want to help the profession and industry as much as we can”.The first occasion Sir William selected to comment publicly on an engineering issue was onthe publication of an excellent report from the Advisory Council for Applied Research andDevelopment (ACARD) on the significance of electro-optics. As this referred to many issuesof national importance he organised a press conference and commented on the report. Butinstead of appreciation for a prompt engineering response, he received criticism from severalInstitutions and even from some EngC Council members. The opponents on Council saidplainly that the EngC had no mandate or duty to make pronouncements on behalf of theprofession. The Institutions stated that it was their job to comment but, in fact, none of themcould do so without consulting their members and none had a rapid reaction mechanism forthis. At a special brainstorming meeting of Council held at the RAC Club this issue wasthrashed out and the result was that the majority felt that the EngC should not make publicpronouncements on specific issues. Sir William believed this was a serious lost opportunityand if the EngC, covering 48 Institutions, could not speak for the profession, he wasconvinced that one of the main reasons for its existence was also lost. Nevertheless, fromtime to time, as Chairman of the EngC and despite lacking support from the Council, he didspeak out on national issues, finding both Government and the media willing to listen andnote his views.At the instigation of Sir William Barlow in 1989, His Royal Highness The Duke of Kent,KG, GCMG, GCVO, ADC, was invited to become the EngC’s first President, therebypublicly raising the profile of the engineering profession. As a member of the Royal Familywith a demonstrable interest in engineering and manufacture, The Duke of Kent was a logicalchoice; at that time he was Vice-Chairman of the British Overseas Trade Board and a nonexecutiveDirector of both BICC and Vickers plc, besides holding other posts in the fields ofscience and technology. He was, for example, Patron of the British Computer Society, a pastPresident of the British Association for the Advancement of Science and a past President ofthe former Institution of Electronic and Radio Engineers. Although at first hesitant aboutaccepting the position, His Royal Highness subsequently demonstrated his support for thework of the EngC by attending many functions, meeting committee members and visiting thestaff at the Maltravers Street offices.1989 marked a clear change in emphasis, if not in direction, for many of the activities of theEngC, its committees, panels and working groups. The influence of a new Chairman and anew Director General was obviously making an impact. The Government introduced novelideas into the nation’s education system and considerations of “Europe” began to influencethe thinking of policy makers. Whilst some EngC activities continued seamlessly during thisperiod, others were phased out and new initiatives were introduced.Interfacing with the InstitutionsNominated and Authorised BodiesOne of the long-standing aims of the EngC had been to reduce, by amalgamation, thenumberof Institutions, some of which had very small membership numbers. Generally,© Engineering Council UK 2004