21st January 2012, 10:19 PM
ecmgardner Wrote:I hear what you're saying RedEarth (I think) but the way I see it, there needs to be one body - whether that's a Union or the IfA that can place pressure on those commissioning work to ensure the environment for raising employees working conditions is created. The current model where profit margins are so slim that cut corners (not standards) are necessary to win tenders is, I agree, the problem. However, if it is stipluated that work can only be carried out by RAOs and the IfA is setting standards and pay minima alongside all the other working conditions its' members must provide to their workers it generates a more level playing field as undercutting to get work can no longer be used as an excuse to cut pay. Then pay can gently move upwards as was the idea after profiling the profession.
The only way I see it working is if there is a requirement.. otherwise we're back where we are now and the loophole is being exploited!
That's fair enough, but obviously standards are cut to win work, both in the top-down manner, that is the bosses are directly instructing it to be done, or indirectly - people who want to do a good job aren't given enough time or are put in impossible working environments, and are then forced to cut standards to fit. And why shouldn't they, after all it isn't their fault? Of course, what often happens is that the people on the ground put in these kinds of positions don't want to cut corners because of bad decisions they can't change so they end up making up the slack in their own time or at their own expense. If the IfA had a set of standards covering this (in detail) or a person in post to deal directly with such things it might be better sorting that out first. I suspect I have lost my own thread somewhere.