Dear All
I was checking through my statcounter to see who had popped in, and to my surprise, I had a visit from an old fart.
The old fart in question was Professor Robert Rennie, a law professor; he was one of the people who denied me justice while at the human rights abusing Glasgow University.
IP Address 130.209.22.237
Time and date 21st December 2010 10:54:23
He is a Professor of Conveyancing.
In law, conveyancing is the transfer of legal title of property from one person to another, or the granting of an encumbrance such as a mortgage or a lien.
When I was complaining about my abusive treatment 'my' complaint was generated by staff, of the people I was complaining about and submitted to him on my behalf, without my knowledge.
Professor Robert Rennie investigated the Glasgow University staff version of my complaint.
He headed a secret hearing into my complaints organised by the people I was complaining about!
I was checking through my statcounter to see who had popped in, and to my surprise, I had a visit from an old fart.
The old fart in question was Professor Robert Rennie, a law professor; he was one of the people who denied me justice while at the human rights abusing Glasgow University.
IP Address 130.209.22.237
Time and date 21st December 2010 10:54:23
He is a Professor of Conveyancing.
In law, conveyancing is the transfer of legal title of property from one person to another, or the granting of an encumbrance such as a mortgage or a lien.
When I was complaining about my abusive treatment 'my' complaint was generated by staff, of the people I was complaining about and submitted to him on my behalf, without my knowledge.
Professor Robert Rennie investigated the Glasgow University staff version of my complaint.
He headed a secret hearing into my complaints organised by the people I was complaining about!
I was:
1/ Not told it was taking place.
2/ Not interviewed.
3/ Not allowed to submit evidence
4/ None of my witnesses were interviewed or allowed to submit evidence.
As a qualified lawyer, he must have known that this was entirely wrong.
In Appendix H of my formal complaint it was sent to the then Principal Muir Russell and all the Vice Principals Robin Leake, Anton Muscatelli, Andrea Nolan, Peter Holmes, Steve Beaumont, and Christopher Morris I pointed out what Rennie and others were up to.
Here is the text of part of the letter sent.
Appendix H is a letter from Professor Robert Rennie, Law Faculty who is also attached to the Senate Office. Professor Rennie apparently was able to conduct an investigation into my complaint without interviewing me or looking at my evidence. He then managed to clear individuals from the Department he is attached to. I should point out that under the university staff procedures this is not allowed. So, either Dr. Jack Aitken when he wrote on the 25th February 2004 is a liar or Professor Robert Rennie has been involved in the covering up of fraud at Glasgow University by investigating a case that he is not allowed to, under the policies and procedures of the University.
My letter and all Glasgow University documents which proved every single allegation went to the senior management of Glasgow University as I said including the current Principal, the corrupt foreigner Anton Muscatelli.
So why did so many people involve themselves in covering up fraud?
Because I was working class and poor, this won’t have happened to me if I was rich and socially well connected.
So, who was I complaining about?
Four Senior Heads of University Departments:
Julie Ommer, SRS Director;
Dr. Jack Aitken, Head of the Senate Office;
Professor Christopher Gilmore, Head of Chemistry
David Fildes, Head of the Data Protection Office who have all lied within my disciplinary process.
Their gross misconduct and lies have resulted in my being the victim of institutional bullying, discrimination, harassment, malpractice and fraud.
You can click on the link and read in detail how they operate:
http://glasgowunihumanrights.blogspot.com/2009/08/glasgow-university-senior-management.html
Glasgow University operate a secret policy of bullying and discrimination and that runs from the top of the senior management downwards.
Corrupt foreigner Anton Muscatelli still hasn’t returned a single penny of the various monies stolen from me or apologised for the way I was treated.
At Glasgow University the rights of the staff abuser are more important that the rights of the victim.
Yours sincerely
As a qualified lawyer, he must have known that this was entirely wrong.
In Appendix H of my formal complaint it was sent to the then Principal Muir Russell and all the Vice Principals Robin Leake, Anton Muscatelli, Andrea Nolan, Peter Holmes, Steve Beaumont, and Christopher Morris I pointed out what Rennie and others were up to.
Here is the text of part of the letter sent.
Appendix H is a letter from Professor Robert Rennie, Law Faculty who is also attached to the Senate Office. Professor Rennie apparently was able to conduct an investigation into my complaint without interviewing me or looking at my evidence. He then managed to clear individuals from the Department he is attached to. I should point out that under the university staff procedures this is not allowed. So, either Dr. Jack Aitken when he wrote on the 25th February 2004 is a liar or Professor Robert Rennie has been involved in the covering up of fraud at Glasgow University by investigating a case that he is not allowed to, under the policies and procedures of the University.
My letter and all Glasgow University documents which proved every single allegation went to the senior management of Glasgow University as I said including the current Principal, the corrupt foreigner Anton Muscatelli.
So why did so many people involve themselves in covering up fraud?
Because I was working class and poor, this won’t have happened to me if I was rich and socially well connected.
So, who was I complaining about?
Four Senior Heads of University Departments:
Julie Ommer, SRS Director;
Dr. Jack Aitken, Head of the Senate Office;
Professor Christopher Gilmore, Head of Chemistry
David Fildes, Head of the Data Protection Office who have all lied within my disciplinary process.
Their gross misconduct and lies have resulted in my being the victim of institutional bullying, discrimination, harassment, malpractice and fraud.
You can click on the link and read in detail how they operate:
http://glasgowunihumanrights.blogspot.com/2009/08/glasgow-university-senior-management.html
Glasgow University operate a secret policy of bullying and discrimination and that runs from the top of the senior management downwards.
Corrupt foreigner Anton Muscatelli still hasn’t returned a single penny of the various monies stolen from me or apologised for the way I was treated.
At Glasgow University the rights of the staff abuser are more important that the rights of the victim.
Yours sincerely
George Laird
The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University
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ReplyDeletefrom your blog posts.
my homepage :: Lawyers UAE
I have always found Robert Rennie to be a thoroughly dishonest chap. Scottish law needs to dump characters like him in order to find itself again.
ReplyDeleteI believe that this vainglorious creep is on the verge of being sucked into his very own vortex of a negligence scandal. How fabulous.
ReplyDeleteThey say that this bumptious old fool was asked to investigate the claims of a whistle-blower that a new school was being incorrectly built.
ReplyDeleteAs per usual, he did nothing and he let the builder continue. Now, it transpires that the whistle-blower was right all along.
Estimated cost of this foul-up - up to £30m
Professor Rennie....they say he wrote the book on solicitor negligence. This (if it becomes public) will be right at the top of the list.
I congratulate you on your excellent website. This will be, at the moment, a source of humiliation to this pompous wee man.
ReplyDeleteLike you, I made a complaint some time ago about the conduct of his company, HM and like you, I explained the position and provided around 20 pages of evidence.
Robert Rennie didn't even look at it.....his response was to the effect that: 'I'm Professor Rennie and I say your complaint is groundless'....
The reputation of the whole legal profession in Scotland is diminished by this type of behaviour.
It's time he retired.
I am not responding to anymore of your emails Do not send any more. I dealt with your groundless complaint years ago
ReplyDeleteProfessor Robert Rennie
Consultant
Tel: 0141 227 9370
Fax: 0141 229 7370
Sound familiar? .....the wee arse is paying for it now.
'You may remember the story of Shirley McKie from about 20 years-ago. She was a Police Officer at Strathclyde Police and she was accused of leaving her fingerprint at the crime scene of the Marion Ross killing in Irvine. McKie said that not only was it not her fingerprint, but she had never even been to the crime scene.
ReplyDeleteIt seemed to me at the time to be a straightforward case which could be cleared-up in no time. It wasn't and Shirley McKee was sacked. I remember that no-one was stepping forward to help and that she was being crushed by the unwillingness of Scotland's public bodies to help.
She want to an independent American finger-print expert. He said that not only was the finger print not hers, but it was really nothing like hers and that any detailed inspection would confirm that.
The case against McKie collapsed as it was now the word of the Scottish finger-prints experts against the word of a world expert.
Jack McConnell stood-up at Holyrood to apologize to McKie and say that it had all been a mistake.
Are we not in the same situation here? I have the opinions of American experts. The opinion of a UK expert (BuroHappold) is locked away in the offices of Hub, Aberdeen City Council and Brodies and they don't want to let anyone see it.
It seems to me that the SG need to provide opinion from a geotechnical expert, within the next couple of weeks, confirming that this school is safe. Otherwise, it it could be said that they allowed a school to be built which they were told would be unsafe and they have allowed it to be used for the last four years knowing that it could fail at any time'.
'I sent the following yesterday to another agency who is assisting me and it involves the Shirley McKie case from about 20 years ago. I am interested in the honesty of those at Holyrood and this example helps. The American expert was David Grieve and his open letter to our Holyrood parliamentarians is attached. In it he states: 'Either is SCRO is right or the SCRO is wrong and world opinion states that the SCRO is wrong.' I think we are in the same situation just now, aren't we, although it's not the honesty of the SCRO that we are questioning, it's the honesty of the Scottish Government.
ReplyDeleteI can remember Shirley McKie's father, Ian McKee, lambasted all at Holyrood at the end of this case for being dishonest and unaccountable. Jack McConnell just shrugged his shoulders and said 'it was a mistake'. Ian McKie's point was that he had been left to do all of the work for 11-years while they did nothing and that is the way I am feeling just now. David Grieve didn't think it was a mistake; he thought it was negligence and nowadays that attitude extends to our legal profession and many of our public bodies.
I consider that at the end of this case a Public Inquiry should be called for to examine the role of the Scottish Government, Hub, Scottish Building Standards and our legal profession in public procurement. Both Harper Macleod and Brodies have spent the past 6-years protecting who?... the public...or protecting Hub from the public - and please accept that there are many countries in the world that do not take the deferential view on the role of the legal profession that we do here in Scotland.
Back in the early days of Holyrood, they ordered an Inquiry into the McKie case which recommended the removal of the 4No SCRO officers who were responsible for the miscarriage and that was done. Move forward 20-years and those responsible for this fiasco have not been removed. In fact, some have been promoted. What does that tell you and are you not concerned by that? That is why I have been encouraging all at the EIS to carry-out their own due diligence on the safety of this school; that's what I have had to do and it is not complex.
I am being blunt just now as I have experienced these situations in the past and they change entirely as soon as an accident occurs. Refusal to communicate will not help anyone and you only have to look at the current Grenfell Inquiry to realize that.
David Grieve's letter reads to me as a plea for honesty from a true professional and it should have been a wake-up call for all at Holyrood. I presume that he could see the systemic failures and lack of honest leadership and accountability that I have seen over the course of the past 5-years. For whatever reason, Holyrood and our legal profession have gone in the other direction and the result of that is they can now be seen as protecting themselves rather than protecting the public.
Finally, we are all waiting on the 2018 report by -----------of-------------and the review by Stephen Garvin of Scottish Building Standards. Please, I would ask all of you to keep the pressure on Jackie Baillie to deliver on this because this is the last chance. This information exists and there is no need for any of us to wait for weeks on it being delivered'.
'The meeting was chaired jointly by Angeline Robertson of Hub West and Charlie Penman of Aberdeen City Council and two senior engineers from Aberdeen City Council provided opinion. It is Aberdeen City Council who employ all of the teachers at the school and so they, and not Hub, are responsible for ensuring the ongoing safety of the building.
ReplyDeleteIf you cast your mind back to the Cole Inquiry; reports into the safety of 17No schools were delivered to Edinburgh City Council on a Friday and the decision on whether to open or close these schools was taken, by the Council, over the course of the next two-days. That explains the over-arching responsibility of the City Council in these situations; they are the employer and so they manage all of the other parties involved, including Hub, and communicate with third-parties. Hence, the report should be issued by them.
Professor Cole and his team reviewed this sequence of events, quite extensively, and affirmed that it was the correct sequence to follow. Surely Aberdeen City Council know this?
As you know, I sent a package of information to ------- last Saturday and I would expect them to react immediately. They will not respond to me of course, but they will respond to Hub North who were their employer and I presume that is what Stephen Garvin is alluding to.
I would ask Hub to issue this report before close of business today. That's what Edinburgh City Council did and, on the grounds of ensuring pupil and teacher safety, they will find it impossible to refuse.
At least we know that the report exists although it is a sad day for all of us when a member of the public has to drag this information out of them.'
Jackie Baillie passed-on your message that her inquiry regarding the safety of this school, which was submitted to you three weeks ago, should be passed-on to Hub North. Forgive me, but I consider this an unsatisfactory response from Scotland's Head of Building Standards.
ReplyDeleteThe position at the moment is that I have asked Jackie to request the report into the safety of this school, which was complied by Angeline Robertson of Hub West and Charlie Penman of Aberdeen City Council, during May and June of 2018, to be released and delivered to her, and to the EIS, by close of business today.
We already have the opinions of more than 40No expert engineers worldwide, including the more recent opinions of BuroHappold, Arup, Cundall and WSP and I would suggest to you that Hub's opinion has no importance in that context; wouldn't you agree?
I refer everyone to the engineering protocol, which is used and accepted worldwide, that requires safety critical information to be delivered within 24-hours and accordingly I have asked Jackie to request this report is issued by Aberdeen City Council by close of business today.
Finally, I wish to make clear that my complaint is not a trivial one. We have all been warned by some of the best engineers in the world that there is a risk that the entire value of this building could be lost and so please, everyone, take this seriously.
I have suggested to Jackie that once this case is over, a Public Inquiry should be held in order to determine what has gone wrong.
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteDon't give Aberdeen City Council any longer than 24-hours to produce the report, please.
My basis for saying that is the 1974 Health and Safety at Work Act, where Aberdeen City Council are 'The Employer'.
This legislation will be used by the Health and Safety Executive in the event of an accident or near-miss at the school and there has already been a near-miss.
The Health and Safety at Work Act is there to protect those who use this building every day and all parties involved will accept that.
I have included Mark McDonald and Liz Smith in this and the last few Emails as this situation will be vexing them too.
Finally, I attach a letter from Fraser Innes of Hub North from early last year; you may remember it. Professor Cole found during his Inquiry that it was best to deal directly with Councils who have very clearly defined public realm responsibilities and I think we should be doing the same.
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteUndernoted are the minutes of my 23rd May 2019 meeting with Stephen Garvin and Scott Johnston. I previously sent them to both yourself and to Bob; you may remember. It goes-on at great length I'm afraid, but meetings of this type sometimes do. Nevertheless, all the information you require is here.
Since the meeting, I have had no correspondence from either Stephen Garvin, Scott Johnston, John Swinney or Kevin Stewart which shows a dreadful impertinence and lack of respect for those of us who are trying to help.
I would again ask the EIS to pass this information on to their advisors.
The design of this school doesn't work, I'm afraid. It couldn't be clearer and when Bill Dodds says: 'I've worked in Building Standards for forty years and safety is in my DNA'....is that it? No further opinion required? We all just accept that?
Items 21 and 22 reference the design checks. I believe that, since this meeting, the Ramsay and Chalmers visual report has been withdrawn and has been replaced by another visual report, this time by the contractor/Hub North/Aberdeen City Council.
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteAttached below are my notes from my 17th August 2016 meeting with the Scottish Government's Bill Dodds (B-) and Jonathan Moore (JM). The meeting was not minuted and so this is the only record of that meeting.
I am not asking anyone to read all of these notes; just read item 1, for example.
My subsequent meeting on 23rd May 2019, with Scott Johnston and Stephen Garvin of the Scottish Government, wasn't minuted either. I have my notes of that meeting too, should anyone require them.
I would ask the EIS to pass this information on to their advisors and Liz/Ross: please pass this information on to any members of the Holyrood Education and Skills Committee who you think will contribute to resolving it for us; I am conscious that the Autumn term starts on Monday.
Dear Liz,
ReplyDeleteTwo things:
1) We need to see this concluded soon as the schools re-open on Monday and so I contacted your colleague on the Education and Skills Committee, Ross Greer MSP, yesterday. Ross understands the subject and the great limitations of Visual Inspection Reports, upon which the Holyrood case still appears to rely, and he is persistent.
2) I believe that Peter Reekie of Scottish Futures Trust, Bill Dodds of Scottish Building Standards and Kevin Stewart MSP are those who have prevented this case from being independently investigated for the past three and a half years. I asked Ross to send the attached photographs to them and request an explanation. We already know what the experts think.
The information specified in recent Emails should have been issued by Aberdeen City Council to the EIS, on Monday. So, am I correct in saying that we are just waiting on Stephen Garvin of Scottish Building Standards to provide the conclusion and recommendations?
1) Before the meeting started, SD presented an example of a similar and recent case which took place overseas.
ReplyDelete2) Like Scotland, this country had experienced a construction failure. This failure resulted in the deaths of many people and so a Governmental Inquiry took place, similar to our Cole Inquiry.
3) That enquiry recommended that an expert technical team are appointed immediately any risk is identified in any building or structure which affects public safety.
4) That technical team are to be assisted by all government employees. A timeline was included in the presentation which showed that assistance is usually provided within 24-hours of it being requested.
5) SD made the point that, in Scotland, the government is not reacting in the same way.
6) That government were implementing all of the recommendations of their government inquiry. SD asked if the SG we were currently implementing any of the Cole Inquiry recommendations?
7) 'Aberdeen School Project Comments and Discussion' - This was sent to the Scottish Government in October 2017. SD asked if it had been accepted by them – specifically, were the identities and experience of the respondents accepted and had their comments and recommendations been investigated. SG said that this was HUB’s responsibility and they would have to answer for that. SD requested HUB’s response.
8) The explanation of Eurocode 7 by Bond And Schuppener was examined. SD stated that GEO limit state failure had taken place before the school was officially opened. SD stated his understanding that this required immediate investigation by a specialist engineer. SG disputed that this was a legal requirement in Scotland.
9) Photo 76 was examined and SD stated that this was an example of a confined artesian layer. This photo was taken in spring-time and so in winter-time this situation will deteriorate further.
10) The report states that these artesian layers are in the north and north-west of the site. It is the north-west of the site which is currently affected by subsidence.
11) Respondents to ‘Aberdeen School Project Comments and Discussion’ came from all over the world. Many stated that upwelling water was the problem and had to be controlled; many stated that subsidence/settlement was obvious.
12) The two respondents from Europe were 10 and 31 Greg Hayes, and 28 Stefan Le Roy. Both refer to Design Standards; Greg Hayes refers specifically to Eurocode 7.
13) We appear to have over 40No expert engineers from all over the world saying that the site needs proper drainage and that subsidence is occurring and no-one is currently disputing that. On that basis, why are we accepting HUB/Aberdeen City Council’s refusal to communicate and to do anything?
14) No information was provided by SG. SD provided 2No photographs which appeared to show obvious subsidence.
15) SG said that subsidence was a rare failure to occur nowadays. SD agreed, but reiterated that subsidence caused by underground scour was the cause of the problem and it was only going to get worse. This was stated in meeting 1 and was rejected by Bill Dodds. We now have evidence to show it is likely to be correct.
16) A photo from ‘Aberdeen School Project Discussion and Comments’ appeared to show large puddles containing a proportion of clay or silt. That is a sign that soil is being washed away from the subsurface layers. This inevitably causes subsidence and many cubic meters of soil can be washed away very quickly by this process.
ReplyDelete17) The effect that this has had on the stability of the soils on site was discussed at length. SD said that this has cut-off the artesian layers and caused the water table to rise and for the effects of ‘piping’ and ‘boiling’ to take place. Both can be extremely damaging during periods of intense rainfall.
18) There is, of course, a risk that installing proper drainage at this late stage will actually cause some degree of settlement. But SD stated that some cracking may occur to a building which was compliant. If drainage is not installed now, cracking will still occur but it will be to a building which is non-compliant and that is an entirely different matter.
19) Repairing cracks in a compliant building is done by the contractor. Repairing cracks in a non-compliant building is completely different from a compliance standpoint.
20) A method of installing proper drainage was suggested in ‘Aberdeen School Project Comments and Discussion’ and that suggestion was generally supported by the respondents.
21) The design checks by Fairhurst, BuroHappold, WSP and Cundall were not provided. SD expressed doubt that they actually existed.
22) SD stated that the visual report by Ramsay and Chalmers was next to useless. All it proves is that Peter Fraser of Ramsay and Chalmers walked around the site and didn't notice the subsidence. It doesn’t prove that there is no subsidence.
23) The limitations of these visual reports were explained by Professor Cole and SD expressed surprise that they were still being used. In the past, they were used by Edinburgh Schools PFI consortium to say that faulty schools were safe and that was made abundantly clear in the Cole Enquiry Report. Why is another City Council still using these visual reports; is this not a question the SG should be asking? The Cole Enquiry report was carried to advise the SG after-all.
24) SD suggested that Professor Cole would recommend the HUB consortium concentrate their efforts for now on ‘Aberdeen School Project Comments and Discussion’.
25) Both SG and SJ stated that the responsibility lay with Aberdeen City Council for the safety of the school.
26) SD stated that photo 70 showing soil collapse was sent to the HUB consortium, including Aberdeen City Council, before the school was even started. Instead of investigating it, they appear to have ignored it and now soil collapse is continuing and threatens the safety of the building. Is this the actions of a client body which puts the safety of the public first?
27) ACC/HUB appear to be doing nothing and waiting for the next stage, which is cracking of the building. SD asked if they were allowed to do this?
28) SD stated that the Ramsay and Chalmers report was commissioned by HUB and not by Aberdeen City Council. Based upon that, the school has been deemed safe for the past 3-years. Given the views expressed by experts in ‘Aberdeen School Project Comments and Discussion’, surely this needs to be urgently reviewed? Either that or make your own design checks available, but we cannot do nothing.
29) investigate themselves. Does the letter from HUB page 56 and the letter from ACC page 57-58 suggest that either organization has any interest in doing so? Should the SG be accepting this?
30) HUB led the consortium which built the school. If the building contains a latent defect, then are HUB responsible for that? They knew all about the alleged fault and allowed work to continue without a proper investigation.
31) Neither Aberdeen City Council, nor HUB respond regarding this school. Jackie Baillie’s letter of 2nd August 2018 was partially responded to by Jennie Laing on 25th January 2019. Where else in the world would this be acceptable?
ReplyDelete32) SD asked that, by publishing the Ramsay and Chalmers visual report, have the HUB consortium removed responsibility for this fault from the contractor and placed it with public bodies instead, be that Aberdeen City Council or HUB? If it were not for ‘Aberdeen School Project Discussion and Comments’ ALL risk would already be with public bodies.
33) Aberdeen City Council have an established Building Control Department containing specialist engineers who can assist. Why are we dealing with the councilors of Aberdeen City Council instead of these engineers?
34) SD stated that as far as he was concerned, Ogilvie were a normal contractor no better or worse than anyone else.
35) We appear to be asking HUB and ACC to contractor with no evidence to suggest they were any different to the others. The process needs to be managed by a strong client body and the problem at Brimmond lies with the HUB consortium.
36) SD explained that there were two design options for the school. A piled foundation, or shallow pad foundations. Shallow pad foundations were cheaper but the site had to be permanently drained first (page 86-88). The shallow pad foundation option was followed and page 71 shows the permanent drainage. The problem has arisen because a deep excavation has been installed which has cut through all of the confined artesian layers and has caused winter-time flooding of the site. The drainage is simply unable to cope with the volume of water which is now inundating the site. SG noted this, understood it, and said he would take this up urgently with ACC.
37) SD explained that when he was on site, the service provided by BuroHappold was completely normal. They witnessed the ongoing work and never expressed any concerns and SD didn’t believe that, at that point, there were any concerns.
38) SD referred to the advice of many ASCE members who suggested increasing the engineering design input on these projects. The HUB consortium, on the other hand, have allowed it to be reduced.
39) SD asked why we in Scotland we are asking councilors, politicians, civil servants and lawyers to sort this out, as it is not working? He suggested we look to the recent Morandi Bridge collapse in Genoa. That was said by politicians to be ‘safe for another 50 Years’; one year later it collapsed resulting in the deaths of many people. After the collapse, the politicians refused to be interviewed on camera; instead the camera crews travelled to Genoa and spoke to the Professor of Engineering at Genoa University. He said: ‘I knew that was going to happen and I told them many times about it. The bridge contains an inherent design fault and it was only a matter of time’. Are we not getting ourselves into the same situation here?
40) SD/SG discussed the timescale for a subsidence failure; was it short term or long term as both have been suggested by him in the past? It is impossible to say, but most would agree that it is weather dependent and most likely to happen during wet winter-time weather.
41) The traditional way to proceed is for the politicians, councilors and civil servants to seek the best advice they can from the technical team and to accept that, if the technical team have concerns, they are real concerns based upon experience. Politicians, councilors and civil servants then ensure their recommendations are implemented. We appear to be far away from that scenario here.
42) The area of subsidence has a SBC of 0kN/m2.SD stated that this was discussed at length during the last meeting on 17th August 2016 with Bill Dodds. It was stated that the Fairhurst report was the stage 1 report which contained design recommendations.
43) The successful contractor doesn’t have to comply with these recommendations, but it would be unusual for him not to do so.
ReplyDelete44) BuroHappold carried-out a stage 2 report. The purpose of this report is to carry-out any further testing missed from the stage 1 report. It does not contain any design recommendations and that is not its purpose.
45) Bill Dodds stated that the required SBC of the soil was 150kN/m2. According to Fairhurst, this was the maximum that could be achieved and that required a relatively dry soil. Excess ground water will therefore eventually lead to softening and failure.
46) SD stated that it was probably the design FoS that was preventing failure at the moment, but that this was a situation which would not last winter after winter.
47) Fairhurst stated that the SBC could drop as low as 0-75kN/m2 and this is what has been happening
48) SD asked if the sentence: ‘Aberdeen City Council and Ogilvie Construction have indicated that the ground levels are as constructed rather than due to subsidence’ is factually correct as we have examined photographs which indicate that it is not correct. The opinions of ASCE members too would indicate that it is not correct.
49) SD asked if the paragraph: ‘You have also contended that a large excavation…had the potential to reduce the bearing capacity of the ground. BuroHappold has confirmed with us that it was aware of this but as it was not under the footprint of the building, was satisfied with the integrity of the original design’ is factually correct as the members of the ASCE advise the opposite is true?
50) Since this letter was issued, the SG have refused to engage in any further discussion regarding the safety of this school. SD asked SJ to confirm whether these specific statements are correct as this letter has effectively stopped all further discussion.
51) SD stated that it was the SG who were responsible for the content of their letters and the conduct of their employees and asked the SG to answer this.
52) SD said that the contents of this agenda were very similar to the agenda followed at meeting 1, on 17th August 2016. Nothing has changed. SD has gathered more information since then, but LESS information has been offered by the SG.
I apologize for the number of Emails I am sending at the moment but I want to conclude this subject once and for all.
ReplyDeleteThe minutes that I sent you on Saturday have already been reviewed by Stephen Garvin, Scotland's Head of Building Standards, and so all that I would ask at this stage is that, if there are any minuted items which are incorrect from an engineering perspective, then let them be known please.
As I understand it, this will be progressed by your agreement that the position set-out in the trailing Email is correct: specifically that the building has been designed as a category 2 and, due to design changes carried-out by the contractor and not notified to the designer, it should have been re-designed as a category 3. This may have required deep drainage and/or deep foundations and so it would have been an expensive solution and, as we know, it wasn't done.
I was told that both BuroHappold and Fairhurst are relaxed about these design changes and do not foresee any problems in the future and whilst I do not believe for a moment that either of you said that, it has led to the current impasse which has gone-on for in excess of four years and which must be brought to an end soon, for everyone's sake. I am either right, or I am wrong and you are both trusted to offer the expert advice required.
Three law-firms have been advising Hub and Aberdeen City Council on this project for more than six-years and have only managed to dig them deeper into a hole where no-one communicates and nothing gets done. Either BuroHappold or Fairhurst, on the other hand, could have advised on this within days.... but they weren't asked. For me, it represents a needless tragedy and one which the Cole Inquiry almost predicted would happen, sooner or later, in Scotland.
'The screw is tightening'...'the net is closing'...on this smelly old tramp.
ReplyDeleteLook out for Bruce Caldow, another politically affiliated lawyer at Harper Macleod, and Euan Couperwhite and Jonathan Moore, two bent civil-servants at Victoria Quay.
ReplyDeleteQuite a line-up of SNP rascals and rogues. It's almost as if Scotland has become a semi-authoritarian state already.
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteCan you update us on the following please.
Dear Jackie,
As you can read below, I sent the John Swinney letter of 20th December 2017 to Directors of BuroHappold and Fairhurst yesterday and I asked them both to check that they are in agreement with it. I do not believe for a moment that they are. I expect they will respond to Fraser Innes of Hub North and so I would ask both teaching unions to contact him early next week to request copies of these responses. If he refuses, they can demand them under the provisions of the CDM Regulations and the Health and Safety at Work Act; it's that easy.
The Ramsay and Chalmers opinion was a Visual Inspection Report of the type which was heavily criticized by Professor Cole. Does anyone know why Hub and the Scottish Government are still relying on them? It has thankfully been withdrawn and so I have made no effort to contact Ramsay and Chalmers.
The responses by BuroHappold and Fairhurst may not tell us explicitly that the school is unsafe/non-compliant, but the convention used at the Cole Inquiry is straightforward and will allow that determination to be made by Scotland's Head of Building Standards. It is his job to do this and, again, you may demand this information from him early next week.
In the event of an accident, the Health and Safety Executive will visit the offices of Aberdeen City Council and will wait there until the reports by BuroHappold, Arup, Cundall and WSP are produced and so why are Aberdeen City Council keeping us all waiting for so long? Does anyone know? That's three or four days now, which seems extraordinary. Are the teaching unions not concerned by this delay?
Please, everyone, I am asking for some communication and some assistance from you. You are all public servants and leaders and you should not be letting me to do everything. Think of this Email as a road-map; just follow the road-map over the next few days and we will get this concluded.
Finally, I have consistently said, since before construction began, that this school would fail and it is the ethical duty of any engineer to do that. I was ignored and, as a consequence, we have all watched the school fail in recent years. My support has come from engineering experts worldwide and from a London based whistle-blowing charity. As I have said before, I believe that this case resembles the Shirley McKie case of 2000 which exposed secrecy, cover-up and a disgraceful lack of integrity within the then Scottish Executive. If the same thing is happening again, and the public are being deliberately misled by Holyrood, then I will take this information to the press.
Dear Mr. Cooper,
ReplyDeleteAfter six and a half years, we are at a stage now where we should be able to conclude this very quickly. Two weeks ago, on 16th October, I suggested that you contact Aberdeen City Council to request a copy of the BuroHappold Design Report which will tell us all if this school is compliant and therefore safe for the winter season ahead.
My rationale for asking the EIS to do this was that you are, in the terms of The Health and Safety at Work Act, 'The Employee' and Aberdeen City Council are 'The Employer' and information of this type usually passes direct from Employer to Employee.
The Report was produced by Rod Manson of BuroHappold, who are one of the foremost design companies in the world. I therefore suspect that it will be thorough and will give you, and all the rest of us, all the information required.
What you have been provided with so far are visual inspection reports, one by Ramsay and Chalmers and the other by Hub/Aberdeen City Council. They tell you nothing and my advice to you is not to accept them.
The BuroHappold Report was produced in May/June 2018 and is held by Charlie Penman of Aberdeen City Council. My understanding of the position is that you only have to ask Charlie Penman for this information and he must provide it, instantly. There is no need to wait for a day, let alone two or three weeks.
Can you let everybody know please if you have been provided with this information and, if you have not, what the hold-up is?
I want to have this resolved by the end of this week and so permit me to add the following example from the opinions of the American Society of Civil Engineers:
ReplyDeleteGreg Hayes: An interesting problem. The original SI identified a ground and (problematic) groundwater condition! design assumingly accounted for this! subsequently the groundwater regime was altered (unintentional cut-off trench) from that assessed in the design! The solution would seem to be restore the groundwater regime to that assumed in the design (as Michael posted). It should be considered installing some standpipes above and below the barrier and to the front of the school to understand the groundwater.
Also a reduced bearing due to inundation at foundation level from groundwater is of concern regarding settlement of the building and infrastructure. Diverting/ restoring groundwater should not unintentionally lower the groundwater table. As EC7 (Part 2, 2.1.4) now details groundwater as a principle, P (no alternative) concern regarding foundation design – 28th September 2017
This is a typical measured response from the ASCE, but there are in excess of forty other opinions like this one. It is for the teaching unions to decide whether or not these opinions outweigh the two visual inspection reports you have been provided by the Scottish Government. I would suggest they do.
Design liability for the Brimmond project should lie with Consulting Engineer, BuroHappold. They have refused to accept it due to changes in the design made by Ogilvie Construction and Ogilvie Construction have refused to accept it due to the Scottish Government's check and acceptance of their new design. Hence and by default, the Scottish Government now have design liability for this school and this explains their refusal to communicate - it's an embarrassing mess, isn't it. I tried to help them, many times, but they refused to listen.
As well as the comprehensive design review from BuroHappold, Aberdeen City Council and Hub North are also in possession of engineering opinions from Arup, WSP, Cundell and Fairhurst as well as their own geotechnical expert Mark Stewart. It is always tempting to say in situations like this: 'it cannot all be bad news'.....but it can and if these opinions are in agreement with those I have provided, then this building will require major works to be carried-out before it can be considered safe.
I have explained the reasons why Holyrood will do nothing to assist you and so I think it is for the teaching unions to progress this with Aberdeen City Council from here.
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteThe below Email, from 13th September 2014, was addressed to Bruce Caldow of Harper Macleod. Had he taken my advice and consulted with Fairhurst, then this case would have been resolved almost instantly. Instead, and without letting me know, he elected to take advice from Euan Couperwhite and Gordon Wilkinson instead; they are accountants and hence we are all in a mess.
Now that the BuroHappold design checks have been requested, we have a true authoritative picture from a world-class engineering firm on where we all stand. Had that been issued in 2018, and maybe we should be asking why it wasn't issued, then this case would have been resolved long ago. It would have been expensive, but less so than it will be now.
I summarize what Professor Cole said in 2017: 'don't leave construction in the hands of accountants and lawyers as it will be a mess'....agreed?
As far as the safety of the school is concerned, this has always been a matter for the Teaching Unions and they can be left to come to their own decision on that.
My situation has remained unresolved for in excess of six-years and this is the responsibility of the Scottish Government and their civil-servants. Let me know when my situation will be resolved please.
Dear Mr. Jack,
ReplyDeleteI have been asking Jackie Baillie since early October for the engineering reports which were produced for this building, in May/June 2018, by Arup, WSP, Cundall, BuroHappold and Mark Stewart of Aberdeen City Council to be provided and I have yet to received a response. I presume that it can be released under instruction from Scotland's Chief Inspectorate of Education, Gayle Gorman? She was Aberdeen City Council's Director of Education during the period of construction and so she has been aware of this problem since 2014.
This is all that is required to bring this case to a conclusion and I fail to understand why it is taking so long. For the benefit of Bill Dodds and Stephen Garvin; what I and many others have said is that a category 2 design has been used for a building which, due to changes carried-out on site by the contractor, required a category 3 design - hence, the building will be unstable without urgent intervention to prevent excess groundwater and surface-water flooding the site each winter. This is not complex and it has been explained to all of you before by expert members of the American Society of Civil Engineers.
I have copied-in Rod Manson from BuroHappold who knows the specifics of this site and who understands that it is an engineer's responsibility to identify engineering problems and get them resolved. That's the way engineering works all over the world. The fact that it takes this length of time in Scotland, and costs an engineer his job, will be a matter of concern to all of you.
Dear Mr. Jack,
ReplyDeleteI first contacted you about this case 9-months ago, on 12th February. I was looking for assistance from Westminster as I had spent the past 6-years corresponding with Holyrood parliamentarians, Victoria Quay civil servants and their partnering lawyers Harper Macleod and I was being ignored. My reason for contacting you was that Holyrood was, in my opinion, not fit to administer this devolved responsibility and that situation should be reported to the Secretary of State.
For obvious reasons, these cases should be solved quickly. The example I sent you, from KSA, showed that a case like this one can be solved within 8-months, but to do that everyone needs to communicate; I have been corresponding with you for 9-months, largely without response, and so your contribution may have helped, but not enough to make a difference.
Your initial answer was that it was a devolved responsibility and that I should take it up with those at Holyrood. Let me say that the two Holyrood parliamentarians with specific responsibility for this school, Kevin Stewart and Mark MacDonald, haven't responded to me once during the past 4-years. Both are Aberdeen MSP's who have a knowledge of the school and the parents of the pupils who attend, but they still refuse to get involved and that is a measure of Holyrood for you. No-one can say that I lack patience, or that I haven't given them a chance, but there is a refusal to communicate and the Secretary of State should be made aware of that.
I have worked directly with two overseas governments and I understand that Rod Manson of BuroHappold has a similar range of experience. These are not countries that share the same reputation for honesty and the rule of law that one associates with Scotland, but you take people as you find them and what has become clear to me over the years is that any malfeasance by government officials and their private sector partners, in these countries, is dealt with quickly and sometimes harshly. The reasons for that are obvious and it does seem to work. We do not have anything like that in Scotland and the present vested interests we see within Holyrood, our civil-service and our legal profession seem to me to ensure that mistakes like this one are covered-up and we can see the same thing happening at the present Alex Salmond Inquiry.
If we go back to the case of Brimmond School; had the Scottish Government investigated my claims properly at the time, then the Professional Liability Insurance of the contractor would most likely have paid for all necessary remedial works to be carried-out. It would have been seen as 'an honest mistake made by a professional'. That is what I was expecting and I gave Jonathan Moore and Bill Dodds every opportunity at the time to pursue this avenue, but they refused and that opportunity is now closed. Jonathan Moore issued his letters of 30th September and 7th October 2016 which absolved the contractor of design liability and placed it instead on the shoulders of the Scottish Government - a extraordinary lapse of judgement which is now proving impossible to mitigate.
It may help if I quickly reprise the legal position, as I see it, at the moment:
ReplyDeleteIt is against the law to build any public building which is non-compliant and this building is non-compliant.
In the event of an accident, the Scottish Government are the party who approved the design and so are likely to be held accountable.
Failure has been caused by a 'latent defect' and responsibility for that lies with the Hub Consortium. The contractor cannot be isolated and made accountable at this stage because the whole Hub Consortium acquiesced.
Everyone from the Scottish Government and Aberdeen City Council, to the Teaching Unions have responsibilities in the event of an accident and they are explained in the Health and Safety at Work Act and the CDM Regulations. The question that is often asked is: 'when were you made aware of this and what did you do to investigate'.
The duty 'not to mislead the public' applies to all parliamentarians, civil servants and their lawyers.
The risks associated with this particular non-compliance cannot be mitigated against and so 'Risk Assessments' are not applicable.
What the above shows is that we currently appear to be positioned far from the requirements of professional and civil-service ethics and criminal law and one may ask how and why several dozen Scottish parliamentarians, civil servants and at least three different law firms have, together, allowed this to transpire over a period of 6-years; can anyone answer that question?
With respect, it is time that some leadership and communication was forthcoming from your office. This is the most serious construction defect that I have encountered in my experience and I suggest that you read through the comments and opinions of the expert members of the ASCE if you want a further explanation of that and what it means for the future of this building.
As you know, my suggestion is that you appoint Gayle Gorman to assemble and distribute all engineering reports on this school, specified in my last Email, to the Teaching Unions.
I want to have my situation resolved now. It has been brought about by the actions of Jonathan Moore and so it is the Scottish Government's responsibility and it has gone-on for long enough.
Dear Mr. Jack,
ReplyDeleteFurther to my Email sent to you on Friday, I attach the following responses which I have received over the years from Scotland's public bodies. This gives you an appreciation of just how difficult it is for any engineer to do a professional job when the Scottish Government and Scotland's public bodies become involved.
If your team can check the veracity of Item 1, John Swinney's letter to Jackie Baillie, then we should have this case solved. I suspect that engineering companies Fairhurst, Ramsay and Chalmers and BuroHappold have not refuted my claims - but we shall see.
I have referred everyone to the undernoted video many, many times before. This explains how accountability is often apportioned in the event of a failure. If you issue a statement saying that you have checked something and that it is OK, and you haven't done that and a failure occurs, then you can expect to be held accountable. Similarly, if you do nothing, then you can be held accountable for that too. I think that should give everyone something to think about at the moment.
This school has already failed and that has been explained to both Bill Dodds, Jonathan Moore, Stephen Garvin and Scott Johnston and Hub's lawyers, lawyers Harper Macleod. They have just been exceptionally lucky so far.
Dear Mr. Jack,
ReplyDeleteThe trailing Email was sent to me by Professor Rennie who is a Partner at Harper Macleod, Hub North Scotland's legal partner. Professor Rennie copied it to all interested parties at Holyrood and Victoria Quay at the time and so they have seen this before. The exception is Ross Greer MSP, who has only recently been copied-in to my correspondence.
I had been in contact with Bruce Caldow, another Partner of Harper Macleod, since early September 2014 and I had been asking him to ensure that this building design was checked and corrected, otherwise it would fail. Neither Professor Rennie, nor Bruce Caldow, have explained to me why Harper Macleod did nothing and that we now have an unsafe building as a consequence.
It does seem to me that Harper Macleod protect the Scottish Government and civil-service and they, in turn, protect Harper Macleod. The public in Scotland therefore have to be prepared protect themselves, as I am doing, if they ever come into conflict with the Scottish Government. Would this have happened twenty years ago and is there any reason why it should be happening now?
It does sound to me as though a good clean-out of the Scottish legal profession is required. Engineers hardly ever come across this type of insolence elsewhere in the world.
I am not responding to anymore of your emails Do not send any more. I dealt with your groundless complaint years ago
Professor Robert Rennie
Consultant
Tel: 0141 227 9370
Fax: 0141 229 7370
Twitter LinkedIn
Harper Macleod LLP
The Ca'd'oro 45 Gordon Street Glasgow G1 3PE
www.harpermacleod.co.uk
Harper Macleod LLP
Dear Mr. Jack,
ReplyDeleteI attach a further two trailing Emails to assist you. The first is from Ross Thomson MSP and it was sent to me on 26th August 2016; the second is from Euan Couperwhite, then of Aberdeen City Council, which was sent to me on 20th December 2016.
Ross Thomson had a good, clear understanding of the problem and he was trying to find a solution.
Euan Couperwhite was not trying to find a solution. Has now moved-on to become Head of Finance and Schools Infrastructure at Education Scotland and that may explain why there is a reluctance to publish the engineering reports which were carried-out on this school in 2018. I therefore suggested that Gayle Gorman be put in charge of distributing this information.
This information should have been released, by Aberdeen City Council, on 19th October and the Teaching Unions will be able to confirm if they have received it.
I hope you have found the time to watch the video ASCE Ethics Case Study 4. This was produced by the American Society of Civil Engineers in conjunction with an American Professor of Law to address the importance of three things in this industry:
Clear communication.
Compliance with Design Standards.
Professional responsibilities.
We presume that Scottish lawyers understand this too, but do they? The Email I sent you yesterday, from Professor Robert Rennie of Harper Macleod, demonstrates that at least some of them really cannot distinguish what is serious from what is trivial in this industry. They do not even try and The Cole Inquiry identified that shortcoming back in 2017.
I trust you are finding this information helpful and we will be able to conclude this very soon. As you can imagine, I want to move-on from this now.
Dear Mr. Jack,
ReplyDeleteAttached are copies of the three Parliamentary Questions that have been asked at Holyrood on my behalf. Question 01539 was asked by Ross Thomson MSP in 2016 and questions 24817 and 24818 were asked by Jackie Baillie MSP in 2019.
I understand that John Swinney's answer to question 24817 is untrue and we are currently waiting on that to be confirmed by Gayle Gorman. No follow-up response has been issued to question 01539 and Aberdeen City Council have been instructed by Fraser Innes of Hub not to respond and so question 24818 also remains unanswered.
Does anyone know why this is taking so long?
Dear Mr. Jack,
ReplyDeleteAs you know, I am trying to move this to a conclusion now:
I attach advice from Fairhurst, who are the Brimmond project's geotechnical experts, shortly before construction started in 2014 and it is very clear: drain the site or shallow foundations will not work. It is remarkably similar to the opinions of expert members of the American Society of Civil Engineers which was issued in 2017, isn't it.
John Swinney has told us that Aberdeen City Council and Hub are in possession of different advice from Fairhurst, BuroHappold and Ramsay and Chalmers which 'categorically refutes' all of this. I find that a most unlikely scenario and so I have been asking for many months for this advice to be issued and no-one is responding.
The weather conditions at this time of year mean that we should perhaps not countenance any further delay, but that is for you to decide. By all means review the 'Site 85' example which I sent you some months ago; that shows you the amount of communication that is required in order to have work carried-out before winter and winter is a lot more benign in KSA than it is in Aberdeen.
Dear Mr. Jack,
ReplyDeleteI attach the final Holyrood Parliamentary Question, 25958, which was asked by Jackie Baillie last year. As I explained yesterday, Aberdeen City Council have been instructed by Hub not to respond and so answers like this one take us all nowhere.
I understand that the Scottish Government has instructed another lawyer to look into this case and so the legal farce continues. Why don't we just do what the Cole Inquiry and all of the professional institutions recommend and that is appoint an independent consulting engineer to investigate these situations straight-away? It is speed, professional authority and transparency that are required and other countries do this all the time. What good is a lawyer in a situation like this?
The only opinions from independent consulting engineers that have been submitted have been submitted by me and that is surely an unacceptable situation?
Dear Mr. Jack,
ReplyDeletePermit me to set-out the legal position for everyone; it is not complex:
1. The attachment sets-out that once a 'GEO limit state' has been reached then advice from a geotechnical expert should be sought. Experts from the American Society of Civil Engineers confirmed in 2017 that the 'GEO limit state' had been reached and they offered remedial advice. The Hub Consortium and Scottish Building Standards have elected to ignore this advice and, if they continue to do that, then an 'STR limit state' failure will occur and that will place the entire value of the building needlessly at risk.
2. The trailing Email to Harper Macleod was sent on 22nd November 2015 and is self-explanatory. Advice from a geotechnical expert should have been sought on or around that date. Instead, nothing was done and I am astounded by that. The contractor's insurer may now refuse to meet present and future costs of this mistake as the Hub Consortium has failed to comply with the law and these costs will be seen as consequential to that.
3. The purpose of my meetings, on 17th August 2016 with Jonathan Moore and Bill Dodds and 23rd May 2019 with Stephen Garvin and Scott Johnston, was to explain this situation to them and ask them to carry-out a proper investigation. My impression of both of these meetings was that no matter what I said or what evidence I produced, their opinions would prevail. Detailed notes from these meetings were sent to you previously.
The law requires us to take advice from a geotechnical expert. Such an expert will solve this case, if it can be solved, very quickly and I have no doubt that the projected cost will shock all of you.
With the exception of Ross Greer, I have sent this information to you several times before. I therefore presume that everyone is now communicating and that Gayle Gorman is resolving this for us?
If I may offer my opinion at this stage it would be that our legal profession needs to be re-set and re-directed to fulfill it's intended purpose, which is public protection.
Date: 22nd November 2015
To: Bruce Caldow, Harper Macleod
Bruce,
I was in Aberdeen last week and took this photograph of the Brimmond playground on Thursday 19th November. I believe that the source of this water, and the reason that it is that is apparently trapped in this location, should be investigated.
You will recall that I believe that there is a problem with the design of this school. Specifically, that the design will allow water inundation, soil collapse and subsidence to occur. I may of course be wrong, but my assertion is supported by the BSI Design Standards and the SI Report.
I am sending this Email to you so that you can kindly pass it on to the appropriate recipients.
Dear Mr. Jack,
ReplyDeleteApologies for the late information, but the following may be useful:
The Scottish Legal Complaints Commission found my initial complaint to be unfounded as I had no independent supporting opinions. A year later, I had assembled a large number of expert opinions and I went back to The SLCC and asked them to re-open the case. Their reply is self-explanatory and is attached below.
As you can see, it's written in the same vein as the responses from the Deputy First Minister, Hub and Aberdeen City Council which I sent you last week. It is a response from Scottish Building Standards that we are all waiting for, of course. Can Stephen Garvin or Bill Dodds advise when this will be provided?
Cllr Jenny Laing
ReplyDeleteCo-Leader
Aberdeen City Council
Town House
Broad Street
Aberdeeen
AB10 1FY
Our Ref: JB15209
02 August 2018
Dear Jenny,
Brimmond School
I write in response to your letter of 19th July 2018 regarding the safety of Brimmond School in Aberdeen.
As you know, the construction of Brimmond School has been questioned by one of my constituents who claims that the design was changed to incorporate a deep contamination excavation which ran the full width of the site from north to south. The effect of this was to re-set the pattern of ground-water flowing through the site and he claims that this will cause ‘soil collapse’ and ‘subsidence’ to occur. These effects can happen slowly, or very quickly and so, if my constituent is correct, it follows that a risk of partial collapse may have been inadvertently built-in to this building and it should be investigated and remedied quickly.
During the course of the past 2-years I am aware that my constituent has presented a range of evidence in support of his concerns, but on each occasion he has been told: ‘We’ve had the school checked by a qualified engineer there is no subsidence’. My constituent has nevertheless continued with his investigations and in September 2017 he consulted expert members of the American Society of Civil Engineers, the clear majority of whom agreed with my constituent’s hypothesis. Still nothing has changed and, by virtue of your letter, my constituent has been told again ‘We’ve had the school checked by a qualified engineer there is no subsidence’.
It does seem that no matter how strong his evidence may be, he will always receive the same reply, whether from the local authority or indeed the Scottish Government. It would therefore seem sensible at this point to take a step back and investigate the strength of the survey, which is a visual survey, by Peter Fraser of Ramsay and Chalmers Consulting Structural Engineers to establish if it would provide robust evidence to protect the owner of the building against claims of negligence, should an accident occur at the school due to defects identified by my constituent, and not acted upon by Aberdeen City Council:
1. The Cole Enquiry 2017
The last failure of a school building took place in 2016 at Oxgangs Primary School in Edinburgh. That led to an investigation into the safety of all recently built schools in that city. 17 of these schools were forced to close until repairs were carried-out as they were considered to be ‘unsafe’. It was found that, upon initial completion and hand-over to Edinburgh City Council, all of these schools were given similar visual surveys by structural engineers saying that the buildings appeared to be correct and that there was nothing of any concern. Professor Cole’s response to that was to recommend that owners should discontinue using these visual surveys. So, since the Cole Enquiry of February 2017, all building owners, and especially school building owners, should no longer be relying upon visual surveys of the type issued by Ramsay and Chalmers to prove the adequacy of design and construction.
ReplyDelete2. The SER Certification Scheme
This is the building control design review system, managed by the Institution of Structural Engineers, which now operates in Scotland. A 2-storey school building on a brownfield site would require to be design checked by an independent engineering team. Any amendment to that design would require another design check by an independent engineering team. Has this been done?
SER do not recognize visual surveys, even for the simplest private buildings. Why, therefore, is this survey being presented as proof of the adequacy of the design and construction on a large public building?
3. Eurocode 7
The ‘ultimate limit state’ ‘GEO’, which is ‘excessive deformation of the ground’ was reached soon after the building was opened. This requires an immediate investigation by a geotechnical specialist in order to determine the cause of the failure and to determine what measures have to be put in place to prevent further deterioration. Has this been done?
A Principal ‘P’ requirement of Eurocode 7 is that no standing groundwater is visible around the apron of a building as it can lead to a rapid degradation of the building’s foundations. Standing groundwater is visible around the apron of this building during each winter and the building will not stand up to this indefinitely. What is the Council’s response to this?
4. Fairhurst’s Soil Investigation Report 83263
This states in the Executive Summary that: ‘The presence of shallow and potentially upwelling groundwater on the site reduces the allowable bearing capacity to <75kN/m-2 and, with this present, they will not be appropriate as a founding strata’. Photographs of the site in winter show that we do have shallow and upwelling water present. Thus, the actual available strength of the soil is less than 50% of that required to safely support the weight of the building. What do the Council propose to do to remedy this?
5. Ramsay and Chalmers Visual Report/Aberdeen School Project Discussion and Comments (14)
We can compare the Ramsay and Chalmers visual report issued in September 2016, with Aberdeen School Project Discussion and Comments (14) issued in October 2017. I note that Peter Fraser is not a geotechnical specialist, the 37 members of the ASCE are geotechnical specialists; Peter Fraser cannot see any subsidence, the members of the ASCE can see subsidence and many of them are not optimistic about the future prospects for this building. Is there not a very clear conflict of opinion here which should be investigated by the Council?
In conclusion, I would suggest to you that the Ramsay and Chalmers visual report is at odds with the views expressed by many others who are specialists in the field; it fails to comply with the requirements of the SER Certification Scheme and the Council’s reliance on such a report fails to acknowledge the recommendations of the Cole Enquiry Report. Further, the failure to comply with the design recommendations provided in Fairhurst’s Soil Investigation Report and to investigate an apparent ultimate limit state failure as described in Eurocode 7 raise concerns about the future safety of the building.
For peace of mind and for the safety of this and future generations of school children, I would be grateful if you would consider initiating an independent investigation of the site.
Yours sincerely,
Jackie Baillie MSP
Dumbarton Constituency
Dear Mr. Jack,
ReplyDeleteBob Matheson has spent almost three years on this case now which is far longer than should have been necessary. So, dealing with Holyrood and the rest of Scotland's public bodies is becoming needlessly difficult, even for the best of us. He advises that Aberdeen City Council are going to reply to me via Jackie Baillie in early January and so I plan to wait for that to arrive.
Permit to make a final point to you before then: Jackie Baillie has written to Aberdeen City Council before, on 2nd August 2018 and received a reply 6-months later on 25th January 2019. Both letters are attached and, as you can see, Aberdeen City Council's letter, from the Deputy Council Leader, is desperately poor and fails to answer anything.
Jackie's original letter still stands and nothing has changed; it just requires to be answered this time. It would be best answered by the technical team at Aberdeen City Council, perhaps assisted by Stephen Garvin at Scottish Building Standards who has an excellent understanding of the problem. However, that decision would be for you.
The Education Scotland Act (1980) allows you to adjudicate in situations like this one; to make sure proper standards are applied and checks are carried-out. One would expect Holyrood to do that but they have never shown a willingness to engage or to communicate. For example, I have not had a single response from Kevin Stewart MSP who is the Minister responsible for Building Standards, or from Mark McDonald MSP who is the local constituency MSP, in over five years and I find that astonishing. I, on the other hand, have worked patiently doing their jobs for them.
You will notice that I have not copied this to anyone at Holyrood as it would be best if you instructed them on how to proceed.
I, and many others, are convinced that a very significant design mistake has been inadvertently built-into this school which requires urgent rectification, otherwise the entire value of the school will be lost. I have said this many times and it is explained in Jackie's letter.
So, if the technical team at Aberdeen City Council replies to the letter attached, then we are all finished and can move-on.
Dear First Minister,
ReplyDeleteI have been trying to resolve this case for the past two years but I appear to be getting no-where fast. According to the Secretary of State for Scotland it is Holyrood's responsibility; according to Holyrood's Deputy First Minister it is Aberdeen City Council's responsibility and according to Aberdeen City Council's Deputy Leader it is the Contractor's responsibility. I haven't heard anything from the Teaching Unions, or from HM Inspectorate of Education, although I have to say that both really should be part of this investigation.
Both governments appear to be saying to me that no Scottish parliamentarian, MP or MSP, has responsibility for the safety of our schools? Are you sure that is what the legislation says?
Let me illuminate the situation with two examples which will be familiar to you:
1. Shirley McKie case of 1997-2008
Shirley McKie was a Police Constable who was accused of leaving her fingerprint at a murder scene in Kilmarnock. She protested her innocence saying that not only was it not her fingerprint, but that she had not even attended the murder scene.
I remember thinking that it was a simple case which would be resolved quickly. Instead, it took 11 years to resolve and at the end, McKie's father, Iain McKie, was extremely critical of Scotland's politicians who he accused of dishonesty and cover-up. They had no interest in engaging with the case, let alone solving the case, and so Iain McKie took advice from independent American experts and HM Inspectorate of Constabulary who solved the case for him and solved it very quickly.
It was such a simple error, made initially by the Scottish Police and the Scottish Criminal Records Office, that it could have been sorted-out within a few days had the right people been asked. Instead, the error was covered-up and Ian McKie had to sort it out by himself and he was understandably aggrieved by that.
A letter to all at Holyrood from one of the American experts, David Grieve, is attached and I expect that you will be shocked by it. The then First Minister, Jack McConnell, said that it had all been a mistake and that was generally accepted although, I'm sure you will agree, what David Grieve had to say in his letter was a warning from a true professional that Holyrood was working at nothing like the standard one should expect from a Government. What I recall is that Shirley Mackie was driven almost to bankruptcy by the case and no-one at Holyrood appeared to be too concerned by that.
So, if it weren't for the investigations carried out privately and no doubt in some desperation by Ian McKie, the case would never have been solved. No wonder he was angry.
Brimmond School is a similar case, isn't it? We already have the opinions of American and world experts. Hence, all we need now is some political leadership and the opinion of HM Inspectorate of Education and this case can be solved? Would you agree?
ReplyDelete2. Piper Alpha Disaster of 1988
This is regarded as one of the top three worldwide engineering disasters of the 20th Century and one would expect the Scotland Office, Holyrood and especially Aberdeen City Council to understand and respect the lessons learned from that incident.
The Scottish investigation, which was led by Lord Cullen, produced a detailed 400No page report which largely blamed 'conflict of interest' in the body which governed platform safety at the time.
The American investigation is summarised in the following 15-minute video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0DYHmpI20lI It was an entirely different and much shorter investigation and its purpose was to apportion accountability. As you can see, the engineers on the platform wanted to 'do the right thing' and close-down the platform; Occidental's on-shore management team in Aberdeen refused and the Americans concluded that this decision was the singular cause of the disaster.
Some changes occurred due to Lord Cullen's inquiry, but more significant changes occurred due to the American inquiry and, as a consequence, American engineering and safety is now amongst the best in the world.
All of the engineers who wanted to shut-down the platform were were killed in the subsequent fire and that is what drove the investigation in America. Also, the fact that this video is valued by many engineers worldwide shows how Americans deal with what they refer to as 'negligence'. How do we deal with it in Scotland? From my perspective, Holyrood does not deal with it at-all and the evidence I have provided over the course of the past five years, and Holyrood's lack of response to it, shows for me that the situation is really no better now than it was during the time of the Shirley McKie case.
The point I am making here is that many expert engineers from around the world identified what was required to rectify this school building in 2017 and nothing has been done about that. Jenny Laing from Aberdeen City Council appears to be blocking any progress towards open investigation and all at Holyrood are just accepting this. I wonder if she is aware of where that puts her, her Council and indeed both Governments, with respect to the Piper Alpha Inquiry, or indeed the Shirley McKie case? It does appear to me that your Government are following the example of Occidental and so I would urge you to step back and look carefully at what you do from here.
ReplyDeleteThe situation at Brimmond School is not that unusual. It happens frequently, routinely in fact, all over the world and disputes are resolved to a timeline, by one or two senior civil-servants and an independent engineering team. That's all it takes. The important thing is that they should be investigated immediately and transparently and not months or years after the event and shrouded in secrecy, as is happening here.
Here, the problem has arisen because a lawyer at Harper Macleod took instruction from an individual at Aberdeen City Council and the Contractor, instead of from me. Neither of them thought to tell me what they were doing or, more importantly, what they were not doing. So, Harper Macleod were told, before the school was built, that it would fail and they disregarded these warnings; they were told again when it was completed and had started to fail and they disregarded these warnings too. It does sound even more delinquent than either of the cases described above, doesn't it? Do you know why the Scottish Government is still employing and paying this firm and does anyone have any idea of how much this could finally cost to put right?
Another relevant subject here are the explanations provided by Kevin Stewart MSP, Peter Reekie and Bill Dodds to the Holyrood Education and Skills Committee Meeting where the safety of this school was discussed. It may be worth investigating whether these explanations were based upon fact. I suspect they may not be.
The way it stands at the moment is that I have asked the Secretary of State for Scotland to use the provisions of the Education Scotland Act (1980) to obtain a full point by point engineering response to Jackie Baillie's letter to Aberdeen City Council of 2nd August 2018 (attached). I asked for that on 17th December; I presume that this is underway and that it will bring this all, finally, to a conclusion.
I would ask at this point that I am kept informed of progress. Presumably that will be by Jackie Baillie, who is my constituency MSP?
Trailing Email sent yesterday to the FM.
ReplyDeleteThe process I am describing in the highlighted text is called 'design review' and it is carried-out all over the world. In Scotland, we appear to carry-out 'visual inspection reports' instead. The last one was issued by the Scottish Government on 30th April last year and stated: 'In addition, on 8 April 2020, a site walkover was conducted with representatives from Aberdeen City Council, Hub North and the Contractor. Nothing was observed or recorded which related to a subsidence problem'. All this confirms to me to me is that there is a conflict of interest going-on.
You will both be familiar with the Cole Inquiry. Professor Cole recommended two things:
1. Don't rely on visual inspection reports.
2. Don't rely on lawyers.
The Scottish Government are still relying on both. Hence, we're all in a mess.
At the stage we are at now, the Teaching Unions can protect the welfare of those who use this building every day and my suggestion is that you take independent advice from your own experts. Iain McKie went to American experts and I did the same. Alternatively, take advice from Professor Cole.
The problem with relying on advice from the Scottish Government and their experts is clearly explained in David Grieve's letter.
Once Jackie Baillie's letter is answered, and that should be soon, I should have this case resolved.
Dear Mr. Jack,
ReplyDeleteI received the trailing Email from the Scottish Government a short time ago.
Let me explain the current situation as I see it:
We are dealing with two Acts of Parliament:
1. The Health and Safety at Work Act which places responsibilities on Aberdeen City Council and the Teaching Unions
2. The Education Scotland Act which places responsibilities on Aberdeen City Council and the Secretary of State.
The Scottish Government employ Scotland's Head of Building Standards Stephen Garvin and they employ my constituency MSP Jackie Baillie. Both are required to solve this of course, but Stephen Garvin has been involved for 2-years and Jackie Baillie for five years and neither has made any appreciable progress. This may be par for the course at Holyrood but I am not accepting it any longer and I don't think you should accept it either.
Hence, and as I see it, the response to this should be by the Secretary of State with input from the Scottish Government, Aberdeen City Council and Hub North. That accords with my reading of the Education Scotland Act.
Please let me know if you are agreement with this or not?
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteI received the trailing Email yesterday.
The position is that we should all be working to the requirements of the 'Education Scotland Act 1980' and that puts responsibility in the hands of the Secretary of State and Aberdeen City Council, not the Scottish Government.
I am therefore not expecting a response from Holyrood. In writing to the First Minister at the start of the week I was simply making her aware of this case. Maybe she was aware of it already, but maybe not. She may want to assist by instructing Harper Macleod, Scotland's Head of Building Standards and HM Inspector of Education to assist the process all they can, but I do not expect the Scottish Government to have a role beyond that.
I think we need to cut to the chase now and so I suggested that the Secretary of State commission an independent design check by a specialist geotechnical consultant. It will be for him to decide whether or not to do that. I believe that it has been done already by Aberdeen City Council and Hub but if they will not disclose the results than it leaves the suspicion that something is wrong with this building and, If that is the case, then we may already be verging on the realms of criminal law. Would you agree?
I understand that Bob is back at work on Monday and so you may want to guage his reaction to this but, from my perspective, I think we can forget about resolving this with the Scottish Government, Hub and Aberdeen City Council. They are not going to investigate themselves and so I do not want or need another response from them.
If you recall the McKie case from the early days of Holyrood (I mentioned it in my letter to the FM); that ended with Iain McKie saying: 'I've already given-up 11-years of my life for this; it's time for the parliamentarians to start doing their jobs'. In my case, it's not only parliamentarians, but Teaching Unions too. So, if you want this case to progress then you'll all need to do it yourselves.
You may remember speaking to Gary McAteer a few years ago by phone. He has assisted me in getting to the stage we are at now. I contacted him last week and asked him to extract me from this case entirely. The situation is that I am blaming the Scottish Government for my situation and I explained that to Gary. I have tried many-times to help them and, as a result, I have lost the last 6-years due to unemployment and short-term working and I must now return to work. I have been proven correct all-along and that is testament not so much to how good I am but to how astonishingly negligent the Scottish Government and Harper Macleod are. He is a resourceful lawyer but he will need assistance. That is all I personally require from the Scottish Government just now.
Apologies Jackie, I should have copied these letters to you last week.
ReplyDeleteThe first letter is from you to Jenny Laing dated 2nd August 2018 and the second is her belated response dated 25th January 2019 which, you will agree, is unsatisfactory.
Hence, in my Email to the Secretary of State dated 17th December 2020, I asked him to request a 'full point for point engineering response' to your letter of 2nd August from the Council and you should be receiving that any day now.
Once it is received, then we will at last have a conclusion to this dreadful case.
Am I correct in saying the letter will go from Aberdeen City Council to the Secretary of State and from the Secretary of State to you? That would appear to me to follow the route-map of the Legislation.
This is another timely reminder of just how improper the relationships are in Scotland between Holyrood, the civil-service and their lawyers and we, the public, are being treated extraordinarily badly by this. As your experience at the Alex Salmond Inquiry shows, this impacts upon innocent people's lives and I think all at Holyrood will need to do a lot better than this in future.
Dear Mr. Cooper,
ReplyDeleteThe last time I contacted you was 18th November last year and so let me to update you on where we are now. I also want to explain to you what I see as the EIS responsibility with respect to this case:
I contacted the First Minister on 4th January and requested her involvement. It has transpired since then that the Scottish Government are responsible for resolving my situation and I only wish that someone had advised the Deputy First Minister of that four and a half years ago as it would have saved everyone a lot of time. I have asked for this to be finalized quickly and that requires Jackie Baillie's letter of 2nd August 2018 (attached) to be answered. I understand that is being done now by Scottish Building Standards.
Where does this leave the EIS? The following advice is taken from the Health and Safety at Work Act and it describes 'Duty of Care'. The EIS are not 'the employer' of course, but you represent 'the employees' and you will be aware of the Duty of Care responsibilities that places upon your organization:
1. Contrary to what you may believe, it is not necessary to show actual injury or ill health in order for you to be found in breach of duty; you may also be held liable under the Health and Safety at Work Act if an individual is exposed to risk.
2. Health and safety offences may only be defended if you can prove that it wasn’t ‘reasonably practicable’ to take measures to eliminate the risk of injury or the risk to a person’s safety.
3. It is a criminal offence to fail to comply with the general duties imposed on you by the Health and Safety at Work Act. It is therefore imperative that employers take their responsibilities under the Act seriously.
It is for the EIS to decide whether the teachers and pupils at the school are exposed to risk or not, but the world experts that responded to me would say they are and the attached photograph shows what would be regarded by any engineer as a potential risk.
Several months ago I recommended the EIS carried-out their own 'due diligence' engineering checks and I don't know if you managed to do that or not? I suggested that because you have been given one opinion, which is shared by the Scottish Government and Aberdeen City Council, and an entirely different opinion which is shared by many world experts. Only one of them can be correct; It is not a complex decision and it can be made relatively quickly and it is for the EIS to make that determination after consultation with your own experts. You cannot wash your hands of these responsibilities and simply take the politically expedient option and item 3 above explains why that is the case.
ReplyDeleteIf, for example, your members are aware that areas of ground surrounding the school are sinking, then it is entirely possible that the same thing is happening underneath the building and the fact that the building hasn't cracked yet only means that you have been lucky. The purpose of this Email is to explain to the EIS that you have a role to play here in terms of the Health and Safety at Work Act and you are not just bystanders waiting for something to happen.
We will soon know what Scottish Building Standards recommend, but I do not expect them to say that there is 'no problem' because world opinion states the opposite and neither I do not expect them to say that a solution is 'not reasonably practicable'.
I have remained committed to solving this case for in excess of the past 6-years and the reason I have done that is because my career in construction, in this country, has been ended by it and that provides a strong motivation. The duties described above will provide the EIS with a strong motivation too and, from here, you may simply want to follow the recommendations of the Cole Inquiry, to which you contributed from 2016-2017. That explains that independent expert checking, free from legal intervention, is required in situations like this one. The EIS have somehow allowed the Scottish Government and Aberdeen City Council to do the opposite over the past two years and hence we are all still going round in circles.
I will contact you again when I receive a response to Jackie's letter from Scotland's Head of Building Standards. In the meantime, your assistance in requesting the earliest response would be enormously helpful. I imagine the EIS will want this finalized just as much as I do.
Dear Mr. Cooper,
ReplyDeleteFollowing-on from my Email on Monday, the trailing Email from myself to Hub's lawyers, Harper Macleod, may be useful to you at the moment.
This is when it was first reported to the Hub Client Consortium and, as you can see, the situation hasn't changed. The school was never going to work and that much was always clear. Somehow, Harper Macleod failed to understand what I was explaining to them and the opportunity was lost and, as a result, a design fault has been needlessly built-in. This will be extraordinarily difficult and expensive to rectify now, if indeed it can be rectified.
I have also explained this in person to Scottish Building Standards on two occasions, but received an equally vacant response from them and so I have reluctantly come to the conclusion that the Scottish Government really doesn't want this to be resolved.
Can I therefore suggest that the EIS instructs the Scottish Government to provide a design check by Fairhurst of Aberdeen, as I suggest below? That will get this resolved quickly and without any more prevarication.
As I alluded to on Monday, the provisions of the Health and Safety at Work Act allow and expect you to issue such an instruction under the circumstances which prevail just now. Fairhurst may agree with me, in which case the building is non-compliant and therefore unsafe. But, that is for the EIS to determine.
Francisco Lucena - I recommend you hire a specialist in geological / geotechnical engineering, to evaluate the specific conditions of your problem.
ReplyDeleteIn general, if as it indicates, the excavation broke the original water continuity within the permeable strata, perhaps with a slightly larger excavation (only for cleaning), covering with geocomposite and intercalations of geotextiles and geomembranes with gravel and clays , helped with some expansive product to seal, could correct the original condition.
This should only be designed by a specialist.
Like the evaluation where originally recommended special foundations, preventing a possible major affectation to the structures, which should be re-evaluated, to make the corrections necessary to avoid problems in the long term – 26th September 2017
Greg Hayes - An interesting problem. The original SI identified a ground and (problematic) groundwater condition! design assumingly accounted for this! subsequently the groundwater regime was altered (unintentional cut-off trench) from that assessed in the design! The solution would seem to be restore the groundwater regime to that assumed in the design (as Michael posted). It should be considered installing some standpipes above and below the barrier and to the front of the school to understand the groundwater.
ReplyDeleteAlso a reduced bearing due to inundation at foundation level from groundwater is of concern regarding settlement of the building and infrastructure. Diverting/ restoring groundwater should not unintentionally lower the groundwater table. As EC7 (Part 2, 2.1.4) now details groundwater as a principle, P (no alternative) concern regarding foundation design – 28th September 2017
Ir. Selvem Raman (இரா.செல்வம்) - Two things comes to my mind, i.e. Time dependant, delayed settlement, which may not necessarily be associated with consolidation, and weather dependant hydro - geological changes in the ground. Without a clear understanding of this issue, it's impossible to prescribe a solution. More study on available data is required and would be able to assist if required. We could have horizontal sub-soil drainage crossing underside the building, drilled and installed at specific level, to drain out water and to not to cause a additional settlement to the structure, temporarily, on the interim, and carry out a study to find a comprehensive solution – 30th September 2017
ReplyDeleteLukman A. - Another site geotechnical investigation should be carry out for the school peripheral. This enable delineation of ground water profile post construction of the school and a better solution can be proposed. Ultimately a form of groundwater drainage method or relief wells will have to be done for the site. Good luck - 01st October 2017
ReplyDeleteIr. Selvem Raman (இரா.செல்வம்) - Perhaps, but perhaps differential settlement hasn't started yet! This has to be confirmed through study/assessment. Everything said here will just be based on assumption based on past experience and theories, and the real cause, has to be found through proper studies. However, couple of things are certain at this stage, i.e. The soil is settling, water is a problem and proper drainage has to be laid quickly to drain out the 'flood' and the level to be kept below apron level, until an appropriate solution is found through adequate studies.- 03rd October 2017
ReplyDeleteAmrit Kumar - Was it possible to collect UDS in this strata? As I can see pictures its boulders and gravel content in the strata. Definitely back filling with same material which has got fine contents (LL = 12%-18% and Pl = 9-12), this type of problem is expected. As sloping face the further drainage paths will carry away fines and such subsidence are expected. I agree with Lukman A, a fresh investigation shall be carried out to exactly spot the problem and further possible solutions. The proposed drainage seems to be one of the solution provided the feasibility of constructing it up to 5m depth? The school building shall be monitored for the ground settlement and building cracks during and after the construction of proposed drainage system. - 03rd October 2017
ReplyDeleteBruce Grayson - You need to protect yourself from future litigation. Drainage can exacerbate settlement. Fill will settle regardless. This is just a botched building job. Someone provided a specific foundation solution, but it was ignored. If you don't want to use expert advice, don't ask for it! .-3rd October 2017
ReplyDeleteStefan Le Roy - What should the maximum design groundwater level be for a general site that needs to operate resiliently over many decades and against a changing climate?! Unfortunately this question has not been addressed in any meaningful way either via guidance or by the professional institutions. It is a passion of mine to get this topic factored into all projects related to infrastructure and development otherwise we are being selective in how we appreciate risk
ReplyDeleteGlenn Hunt, PE, IntPE - 1. Contractor changed the site conditions and drainage patterns. The previous subgrade conditions were eliminated once soil was removed and reset.The challenge here is totally different than detailed in the original geotechnical report.
ReplyDelete2. Question can you confirm that once soil was removed that it was adequately compacted into place and quality of materials compacted was suitable?
3. The typical shallow footing mostly is fine due to the changed subframe conditions. Remember the special foundation was only necessary for the existing site.
4. You say the subgrade now is more impervious than before, this is good in mitigating building settlement but bad for natural subterranean water flow, a french drain or some sort of drainage application is all that is missing here. Your design seems to be going in the right direction.
5. The ponding seen near the building is exasterbated because the as constructed condition ignored drainage. Also the building could be experiencing the same settlement over the entire footprint and not noticed locally. This would contribute to pounding around the building.
Abhishek Kaushik - Can this site be excavated again? If yes then I would suggest you to excavate it to 6m and then put a permeable & graded stone fill at that site up to 3m and then recover it up to ground level with coarse sand. It will provide the water, the required space to flow & connect to the previous drainage pat
ReplyDeleteJeffrey Riedel P.E. - I agree, a gravity drain system, drain gravel wrapped in Geo textile with a perforated pipe in the bottom for good measure. Along with surface grading to route surface water away from building. Just make sure the water that gets discharged doesn't flood anyone down gradient.
ReplyDeleteGreg Hayes - I would first monitor including standpipes to assess groundwater. Having unintentionally altered groundwater you do not now want to unintentionally lower the level which potentially will induce settlement in the ground, building or adjacent properties; particularly if as the SI indicated there are sands present. Scour of fine sediment seems likely to be occurring based on the 'dirty' water you mention this is altering the volume of the ground and change in volume equals consolidation/ settlement. The foundation of the building is likely at risk where un-natural groundwater level exists. or perhaps it has reverted back to natural state , standpipe may confirm this.
ReplyDeleteIf the Fill is behaving as expected it is likely groundwater has stabilised at a natural level here, standpipes can confirm this. Consider the standpipe design input data for assessing the proposed drain invert,
Omar Zanoli - Difficult to provide guidance without a full picture of the soil and hydrogeology conditions. Would be glad to help if some more details will be available. From my perspective to stop an upwelling flow the best solution would be to install sub-horizontal drains underneath the foundations
ReplyDeleteBill Dobbs - The key is to re-establish drainage on the site.
ReplyDeleteKlaas Kinsbergen - learn to investigate the soil upfront and not afterwards, saves you 500% on the foundation if you have to make it afterwards
ReplyDeleteKlaas Kinsbergen - Dear Sir, was there an investigation of the rise of the water out of the second layer (over tensioned water)
ReplyDeleteKlaas Kinsbergen - During winter time normally the ground water level is higher so and that makes the soil less resistant so I think problem defined. And if the problem is defined the solution also can be defined
ReplyDeleteGregory Murawski, P.Eng. - Without looking at the design and geotech report, likely two issues short and long term issues needed to be addressed. Proper control of the surface runoff temporary for construction and permanent after construction to eliminate it as a contributor to the issue cannot be underestimated. Phreatic surface of the groundwater needed to be adequately lowered below the excavation base to remove hydrostatic uplift and to safely protect the footing bearing soils from permanent damage. Hopefully this damage hasn’t happened. Phreatic surface after construction needs to be at the adequate levels below finished grades to keep them dry and stable. Application of temporary and permanent strategically located horizontal and vertical relief drains, blanket drains and curtain drains and diaphragm wall could help. Ground water monitoring should be incorporated in all instances
ReplyDeleteKlaas Kinsbergen - What you can do is put a constant drainage along the perimeter of the school and try to lower the groundwater permanent, this will cost you money and you need to see if it is possible with regulations, in The Netherlands you cannot do that. This will increase the stability of the foundation. Basically this is temporary to go to the final and costly solution...
ReplyDeleteDear Secretary of State,
ReplyDeleteIn Scotland, we do not have the equivalents of Laura Kuenssberg and Robert Peston to hold Holyrood to account and so, a week ago, I took the opportunity to publish all recent letters on the internet so that they are available to anyone who has an interest in the safety of this school. Members of the public can now ask: 'When did you know about this and what did you do to investigate?'
This is not something that I ever intended to do, but the passage of time means that the usual avenues of Scottish Government and legal intervention have had to be discarded. Life moves-on and, after more than 6-years of waiting, I'm sure you will understand that less conventional routes have had to be followed.
The information which is attached to the website at the moment is being followed-up in due course by engineering opinion and legal opinion by the American Society of Civil Engineers. Most of this information has been sent to you already, several months ago, but not all of it.
The website which has published this information was set-up several years ago to address the problem that law in this country is currently being used to protect a privileged few and has therefore become the antithesis of its centuries-old public protection role. The frustration endured by George Laird is obvious and is, I'm afraid, a product of the current state of Holyrood and our legal profession and that view is shared by many of us at the moment.
The fact that Professor Robert Rennie adjudicated on George Laird's case and also adjudicated on my case is, I'm sure, neither here nor there. If, however, there are other individuals associated with other schools who are being treated in the way that I have been treated by the Scottish Government and their legal partners, then that suggests to me that we have a malign problem at Holyrood which should be identified and addressed; presumably, that's the Lord Advocate's role. We cannot just let this go-on year after year until it gets to this stage.
As I have stated already, my involvement in this school is at an end. I have been unemployed for the past two years and have only been employed sporadically over the course of the past 6-years. The reason for this is because the Scottish Government and the Hub Consortium have failed to do their job honesty and I have had to do it for them. Had I not done that, then the entire value of the school would have been lost and accountability for that loss would never have been established. Hence, the responsibility for resolving my situation lies, as I see it, with the Scottish Government.
I understand that the school is due to re-open in a few weeks time and so there is no time left for further discussion. I think it has all been said and that we only await a resolution now and, as provided in the Education Scotland Act 1980, I see it as your role to guide all at Holyrood over the coming days and I hope you agree with that.
This is the letter that we are all waiting to be responded to. The response should come from Stephen Garvin at Scottish Building Standards. It's not a complex letter is it? Should it take years to respond to a letter like this? Do the Teaching Unions know about this letter? Why are they not demanding a response?
ReplyDeleteCllr Jenny Laing
Co-Leader
Aberdeen City Council
Town House
Broad Street
Aberdeeen
AB10 1FY
Our Ref: JB15209
02 August 2018
Dear Jenny,
Brimmond School
I write in response to your letter of 19th July 2018 regarding the safety of Brimmond School in Aberdeen.
As you know, the construction of Brimmond School has been questioned by one of my constituents who claims that the design was changed to incorporate a deep contamination excavation which ran the full width of the site from north to south. The effect of this was to re-set the pattern of ground-water flowing through the site and he claims that this will cause ‘soil collapse’ and ‘subsidence’ to occur. These effects can happen slowly, or very quickly and so, if my constituent is correct, it follows that a risk of partial collapse may have been inadvertently built-in to this building and it should be investigated and remedied quickly.
During the course of the past 2-years I am aware that my constituent has presented a range of evidence in support of his concerns, but on each occasion he has been told: ‘We’ve had the school checked by a qualified engineer there is no subsidence’. My constituent has nevertheless continued with his investigations and in September 2017 he consulted expert members of the American Society of Civil Engineers, the clear majority of whom agreed with my constituent’s hypothesis. Still nothing has changed and, by virtue of your letter, my constituent has been told again ‘We’ve had the school checked by a qualified engineer there is no subsidence’.
It does seem that no matter how strong his evidence may be, he will always receive the same reply, whether from the local authority or indeed the Scottish Government. It would therefore seem sensible at this point to take a step back and investigate the strength of the survey, which is a visual survey, by Peter Fraser of Ramsay and Chalmers Consulting Structural Engineers to establish if it would provide robust evidence to protect the owner of the building against claims of negligence, should an accident occur at the school due to defects identified by my constituent, and not acted upon by Aberdeen City Council:
1. The Cole Enquiry 2017
The last failure of a school building took place in 2016 at Oxgangs Primary School in Edinburgh. That led to an investigation into the safety of all recently built schools in that city. 17 of these schools were forced to close until repairs were carried-out as they were considered to be ‘unsafe’. It was found that, upon initial completion and hand-over to Edinburgh City Council, all of these schools were given similar visual surveys by structural engineers saying that the buildings appeared to be correct and that there was nothing of any concern. Professor Cole’s response to that was to recommend that owners should discontinue using these visual surveys. So, since the Cole Enquiry of February 2017, all building owners, and especially school building owners, should no longer be relying upon visual surveys of the type issued by Ramsay and Chalmers to prove the adequacy of design and construction.
2. The SER Certification Scheme
This is the building control design review system, managed by the Institution of Structural Engineers, which now operates in Scotland. A 2-storey school building on a brownfield site would require to be design checked by an independent engineering team. Any amendment to that design would require another design check by an independent engineering team. Has this been done?
SER do not recognize visual surveys, even for the simplest private buildings. Why, therefore, is this survey being presented as proof of the adequacy of the design and construction on a large public building?
ReplyDelete4. Fairhurst’s Soil Investigation Report 83263
This states in the Executive Summary that: ‘The presence of shallow and potentially upwelling groundwater on the site reduces the allowable bearing capacity to <75kN/m-2 and, with this present, they will not be appropriate as a founding strata’. Photographs of the site in winter show that we do have shallow and upwelling water present. Thus, the actual available strength of the soil is less than 50% of that required to safely support the weight of the building. What do the Council propose to do to remedy this?
5. Ramsay and Chalmers Visual Report/Aberdeen School Project Discussion and Comments (14)
We can compare the Ramsay and Chalmers visual report issued in September 2016, with Aberdeen School Project Discussion and Comments (14) issued in October 2017. I note that Peter Fraser is not a geotechnical specialist, the 37 members of the ASCE are geotechnical specialists; Peter Fraser cannot see any subsidence, the members of the ASCE can see subsidence and many of them are not optimistic about the future prospects for this building. Is there not a very clear conflict of opinion here which should be investigated by the Council?
In conclusion, I would suggest to you that the Ramsay and Chalmers visual report is at odds with the views expressed by many others who are specialists in the field; it fails to comply with the requirements of the SER Certification Scheme and the Council’s reliance on such a report fails to acknowledge the recommendations of the Cole Enquiry Report. Further, the failure to comply with the design recommendations provided in Fairhurst’s Soil Investigation Report and to investigate an apparent ultimate limit state failure as described in Eurocode 7 raise concerns about the future safety of the building.
For peace of mind and for the safety of this and future generations of school children, I would be grateful if you would consider initiating an independent investigation of the site.
Yours sincerely,
Jackie Baillie MSP
Dumbarton Constituency
Dear First Minister,
ReplyDeleteI still await a response to my letter to you, referenced above, of 4th January 2021. Your reply should include a full answer to Jackie Baillie's letter (attached), of 2nd August 2018, by Scotland's Head of Building Standards. Please advise when this will be issued.
I have previously advised both your Government and the EIS Teaching Union that 'Life Safety Clarifications', such as this one, are dealt with immediately by Governments throughout the world. Can I ask what you finding so complex about this and why is it taking so long?
Dear First Minister,
ReplyDeletePermit me to set-out the legal position which has been explained to me by three senior members of the American Society of Civil Engineers. They are not lawyers, but they are regarded as 'expert witnesses' in construction law courts worldwide. What we are dealing with here is not complex from a legal standpoint and there was close unity of opinion from all three.
Before we start, let me explain that in a Design and Build contract of the type used by Hub, all liabilities should lie with the Contractor. The problem at Brimmond School is that, due to the actions of your Jonathan Moore and Bill Dodds, neither of these liabilities currently lie with the Contractor. Instead, they lie with the Scottish Government, Aberdeen City Council and the Teaching Unions and these liabilities amount to tens of millions of pounds.
Liability for safety lies with Aberdeen City Council and the Teaching Unions and liability for the costs involved in rectifying the school lies with the Scottish Government. It is therefore for the Teaching Unions to call for the school to be rectified and if they don't do it then no-one else will. The Contractor will no doubt agree to go back and do the work, but he will have to be paid and that, of course, is the problem.
The situation is analogous to the new Edinburgh Sick Kids hospital where the original design was non-compliant but, because it had been checked and accepted by the Scottish Government, then the Scottish Government has had to pay to have it rectified. It's that simple, I'm afraid. I don't know if Jonathan Moore and Bill Dodds were involved in that project or not, but it wouldn't surprise me if they were. The Teaching Unions need to get involved at this point and I'm afraid there is no other way of solving this.
The decision whether to fix the school or continue to do nothing is not for the Scottish Government, it is for the Teaching Unions. All the Scottish Government will do is commission the work and pay for it. These respective responsibilities are set-out in the Health and Safety at Work Act and I have explained them to the Teaching Unions many times. This should not be looked upon as 'doing the right thing', rather it is a hard and fast requirement of law.
I understand that Hub have also had three legal opinions, from Harper Macleod, Muckle and Brodies and it would be helpful to know what their view is; presumably it is in close agreement with those I have provided and you will be prepared to share them with the Teaching Unions.
As you will be aware, I am trying to move this to a conclusion now and, from the perspective of the Teaching Unions, they will feel they have to move it to a conclusion before the schools return. What is not helping is the refusal to communicate which exists at the moment and I would ask you to ensure that either your Government, or the Teaching Unions, show the leadership required to resolve this.
I spent 3-hours explaining this to Stephen Garvin on 23rd May 2019 and that is more than enough. I would ask you to kindly instruct him to get this answered as you will understand that I am unwilling to go-on paying for the intransigence of your civil-servants.
I will publish this letter on the internet and I would ask the Teaching Union to ensure that it is available, along with the American Society of Civil Engineers engineering advice I have provided, to all of their members who use this building every day.
Dear Mr Cooper,
ReplyDeleteI will continue to wait for a reponse from the Scottish Government, but I believe that the EIS should be pursuing this separately and independently. The building is 'unsafe' and yet it continues to be occupied each day by teachers and pupils and really, that situation cannot go-on, can it?
If there is an accident at the school, then liability will lie with the EIS and with Aberdeen City Council and so there is a duty on both of you to show honesty and accountability and to drive this forward. It is not easy to do that in Scotland and your colleagues at Unison will no doubt tell you that, but it needs to be done.
All the information you require was sent to you on 17th April 2019. Let me know please if you require it to be re-sent or if you want clarification on any of the points made in this or previous correspondence.
Dear Mr Cooper,
ReplyDeleteI have thought about and taken advice on the meeting which I am proposing between myself, the EIS and the Health and Safety Executive and so let me set-out the arrangements which would see everyone get the most out of the meeting:
1. I would expect to explain my concerns and to answer questions, but the meeting would be called by the EIS and those invited to attend would be at the discression of the EIS.
2. You may want to invite Stephen Garvin, of Scottish Building Standards.
3. The Health and Safety Exceutive (HSE) will require to be given all information one-week before the meeting is called. My information was provided on 17th April 2019 and that should be passed-on, by the EIS, to the HSE.
4. The purpose of the meeting would be to determine if the as-built design is compliant, or not.
5. The EIS will ask Scottish Building Standards for their information and will likewise pass it on to the HSE. From what I am aware, this information is weak and appears to comprise mainly of visual inspection reports (example below). They may not want to hand this over, in which case I would ask that the meeting go-ahead nonetheless and only my information will be reviewed.
6. The HSE will distribute the information they receive to their own independent expert engineers for review.
7. A list of questions will be complied and sent to the EIS.
8. An agenda will be complied by the EIS and sent-out to all attendees 48-hours before the meeting.
9. Minutes will be taken by the HSE. They may not distribute them to us in which case I would ask the EIS to produce a set of minutes. It is for the EIS to determine who would receive a copy of these minutes.
I would expect the HSE to be advised by independent experts and that is very much what is required. We are stuck inside a 'doom-loop' at the moment where no-one is communicating; the HSE will understand that and they have significant powers to see that the process is put back on the rails again. Once the HSE are involved there will be no more prevarication, for anyone.
As I see it, this meeting is the opportunity to get this long-running case concluded once and for all and I trust you are in agreement.
Let me know please - do you have my information of 17th April 2019, or do you want me to re-send it?
Dear Mr Cooper,
ReplyDeleteI received a machine generated response from the Scottish Government a short time ago promising a response to my Email, addressed to you, of yesterday. I do want or expect the Scottish Government to answer this as it is your responsibility to do that.
The Scottish Government are only reponsible for paying for this to be corrected. Responsibility for the ongoing safety of the school lies with Aberdeen City Council and the EIS and my Email of 19th October 2020 explains this.
The final arbiters on health and safety matters are the Health and Safety Executive and they know more about the respective duties applicable under the Health and Safety at Work Act than any lawyer and they have access to expert engineers who will offer an opinion on this very quickly. If the school can be rectified at this stage, then they will tell you that.
Please confirm when the meeting will take place.
Dear Mr Cooper,
ReplyDeleteAs I understand it, there are only three weeks left until the Holyrood recess and so this needs to be done very quickly. Jackie will liase as necessary with the Scottish Government and the EIS will liaise with the Health and Safety Executive.
The HSE will respond to you within 24-hours.
Appologies Mr Cooper but, undernoted, I have attached the only information the HSE will need to make their initial asessment:
ReplyDelete1. Opinions of 40No expert members of the American Society of Civil Engineers, issued 15th November 2017.
2. Letter from Jackie Baillie MSP to Aberdeen City Council, issued on 2nd August 2018.
They will have an initial assessment ready for you my tomorrow afternoon.
Dear First Minister,
ReplyDeleteI have just received yet another automated response promising a letter from your Government. Please note that neither I, nor anyone else, is expecting a letter from the Scottish Government as the action is not with the Scottish Government.
Time has moved-on and the way it stands at the moment is as follows:
1. The safety of the building is the responsibility of the EIS and Aberdeen City Council. I have suggested that a meeting is called with the Health and Safety Executive to discuss the information I have provided and any concerns the teachers may have. I have offered to attend.
2. I have been unemployed for the past 2-years and working itinerantly for the past 6, nearly 7 years because of this and so I want to have my situation settled now. I have asked Jackie Baillie MSP and Gary McAteer from Beltrami to assist me with that.
Let me be very clear, the last letter I received from the Scottish Government is attached below and it is one of the most incompetent letters you are ever likely to read on this subject and the consequences for the school, and for me personally, have been profound. It is therefore time to leave this to the professionals.
Dear First Minister,
ReplyDeleteI have received several automated responses from your Government recently, I received another yesterday and yet another a short time ago today, promising a reply. Your last reply was from Matthew Rennie of your Schools Infrastructure Unit at Victoria Quay. I'm afraid that Matthew doesn't understand the concept of safe and unsafe buildings and so it it is pointless asking him to respond to me again. Forgive me, but this problem was explained to many expert engineers over three years ago and they understood it straight away and responded with constructive and measured opinions. Why can no-one in the Scottish Government do that? You currently have two Heads of Building Standards - why can they not respond?
Let me set-out the way it stands at the moment:
The arbiter of safety in buildings is the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) and I have asked Jackie Baillie MSP to ask the EIS Teaching Union to report this school to them. I have provided sufficient information for the HSE to carry-out an initial assessment of the safety of the building and they will do that within 24-hours. The HSE is a non-political organisation; they will ask your Head of Building Standards for information in support of his assertion that the school is safe. He doesn't have to provide the HSE with anything and if he elects to do that then the HSE will simply work with the information I have provided. I have not redacted or removed anything and I have said to Jackie that if any further or specific information is required then I will provide it.
So, the action at the moment lies with the EIS, HSE, your Heads of Building Standards Bill Dodds and Stephen Garvin, your previous Head of Schools Infrastructure Jonathan Moore and current Head of Schools Infrastructure Euan Couperwhite. I will respond to either of these gentlemen or to the HSE, or to Jackie Baillie.
The heritage of the HSE makes them one of the most respected safety organisations in the world and their purpose will be to tell us if this building is stable or not. They have access to the independent experts which will solve this problem for us very quickly and it should be a matter of regret to all of us that they weren't consulted several years ago.
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteI have received a number of large number of responses from 'casehandling.service@gov.scot' promising to respond to me. As you can see, I received another two of them yesterday. The reference numbers are as follows:
202100181890 - 22nd March
202100181850 - 22nd March
202100180583 - 19th March
202100179151 - 18th March
202100178228 - 17th March
202100172297 - 8th March
The position is very simple and it can be resolved in one letter. Let me explain:
1. I have offered to assist the Health and Safety Executive or to meet with them to explain the engineering data and opinions that I have provided. I just need to know: 'Is this assistance required, or not?'
2. My situation is the responsibility of Scotgov and their lawyers Harper Macleod. It has gone-on for almost 7-years now and it can be resolved quickly.
Neither of the above is complex and it just needs to be done. Are you able to focus the First Minister on the job in hand please?
As I have said before, cases like this one occurr worldwide and they are investigated and resolved within days, weeks or months. That is because there is such a high financial and human cost involved when you don't do that and we are seeing that here, aren't we.
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteI include the Secretary of State for Scotland in the distribution as I believe he has jurisdiction over this matter in terms of the Education (Scotland) Act 1980. I am no lawyer and so I may well be wrong about this, but that is my understanding of it.
If Holyrood is in recess, can your office staff pass this message on to one of the Scottish Government's civil-service team who are able to act upon it? From the knowledge I have, Scott Johnston may be the most appropriate, but I'll leave that up to you.
I decided to make a formal complaint to the Institution of Civil Engineers at the start of this week regarding the conduct of their members Jonathan Moore, Bill Dodds and Stephen Garvin. I won't go into the detail of the complaint just now as it will make this Email too complex, but I think we can leave the investigation into the 'whistle-blowing' aspect of this case to them.
That leaves the design check/design review of the school building which I believe is being carried-out by Edinburgh hyrdrology consultant Kaya Consulting. That should be very close to concluding now, and I will accept Kaya's findings. The only nervousness I had about this was in ensuring Kaya were given access to my information, which included the opinions of many of Kaya's contemporaries all over the world. As you know, I have no confidence in the honesty of Jonathan Moore to do this and so are you able to confirm that this has been done?
As I see it, the responsibilities so far can be summarised as follows:
1. The Institution of Civil Engineers will investigate the conduct of Scottish Building Standards.
2. The EIS and Aberdeen City Council will act upon the findings of Kaya Consulting's design review.
There are recent precedents for both of these situations and all involved will be aware of them.
That leaves my situation to be resolved and, as I have set-out previously, the Scottish Government's letters attached are incorrect and they set in-train a series of needless outcomes for the school and for me. I have asked that Gary McAteer resolve this as he knows the case and has the necessary gumption to get it concluded.
Dear Carol,
ReplyDeleteWhat I am reporting to the ICE is that 'whistle-blowing' as described by the ICE, IStructE and the Engineering Council doesn't work in Scotland and I have provided the example of a case where your members have stopped it from working.
The purpose of whistle-blowing is to avoid conflict and disputes ocurring in the first place and so it is too late to report this as a conflict or a dispute. It is neither; it is a case of whistle-blowing which has failed and the financial and human costs of that are needless. All I am asking the ICE to do is ascertain why it was not properly investigated by Scottish Building Standards at the time and why I have had to do it myself? Why do they refuse to communicate and so needlessly prolongate these matters? I understand that your members are employed by the Scottish Government and are instructed by them, but they are still professional members of your Institution with all of the ethical duties which that entails.
There are two opinions on the compliance of this building and they are both entirely different. One opinion is by ICE members which says that it is compliant and another by ASCE members, which included two specialist groundwater engineers from the ICE, which says the opposite. They cannot both be right; one says that there is no problem and the building is safe and the other says the opposite. The Scottish Government are currently investigating which opinion is correct and the results of that are due any day now.
Finally, I attach a relatively minor example of the way whistle-blowing works overseas and this is the way it should work here too. In this case the whistle-blower was a farm-labourer but, as you can see, his complaint was taken seriously right up to the most senior levels of Government. He wasn't asked to fill forms, just to make a statement of what he believed was wrong and the Government would do the rest. After investigation he was found to be correct and they usually are correct. I explained this example to Scotland's Head of Building Standards in May 2019, obviously to no effect.
Dear Liz,
ReplyDeleteApologies for contacting you on election day, but perhaps your office staff could take care of this:
I am in contact just now with the Institution of Civil Engineers who are investigating the circumstances of the Brimmond School case. I referred them yesterday to the meeting of the Education and Skills Committee which took place in early 2017, when the safety of this school was discussed.
Present at the meeting were yourself, Ross Greer, James Dornan, Kevin Stewart, half a dozen or so other MSP's and, representing the Institution of Civil Engineers, Peter Reekie and Bill Dodds. The meeting was minuted and I remember reading the minutes at the time but I cannot locate them just now. I wonder if your office staff could find them and send them on to the Secretary of State for Scotland and the Institution of Civil Engineers at the addresses above?
Since that meeting, I have provided a great deal of additional expert opinion from the American Society of Civil Engineers and the Institution of Civil Engineers now has opinion from UK experts and so we are at last in a position where a final determination can be made and properly communicated to all of the parties involved. However, they all presumably want to understand how and why the current situation has been allowed to develop the way it has and it can all be traced back to this meeting.
I can understand why Holyrood has chosen to accept assurances from Peter Reekie and Bill Dodds, but I am at a loss to understand why Stephen Garvin of Scottish Building Standards hasn't done anything for the past two-years. He has all of the information and has been able to weigh one opinion against the other and the fact that he hasn't done that seems astonishing to me.
Jackie - as you will be aware, my life has been virtually on-hold for the past 7-years because of this and so I would ask for assistance from Scottish Government at this stage. There appears nothing whatsoever to stop my situation being resolved now.
Dear Mr Jack,
ReplyDeletePermit me to add the following which will speed things-up: The attachment has been sent to you all previously and shows how a similar situation is resolved overseas. A senior parliamentarian instructs a civil-servant and then steps aside; it is for the civil-servant to manage the whole process from start to finish.
No lawyers were involved and this case was resolved in 36-weeks.
As you can see, when the process is moving along communication takes place sporadically, every few weeks. When the process stalls, communication takes place every day and sometimes twice a day. This is viewed simply as what needs to be done to keep the process moving. In Scotland, we think that this is somehow unusual and to be discouraged and I cannot, for the life of me, understand this; can you?
I'm sure the Institution of Civil Engineers will have seen many similar cases and would be able to advise you but, in my opinion, this example is fairly typical of what works worldwide.
Can I suggest that Scotland's Head of Building Standards, Stephen Garvin, is instructed to produce a finding, urgently, on this? Many engineers have done this already and it is not complex. I have done it myself and I have explained it to both Stephen Garvin and his predecessor, Bill Dodds several years ago.
Dear Mr Jack,
ReplyDeleteI am copying this to Stuart Campbell and George Laird who have both provided me with valuable assistance over the course of the past 4-months. The undernoted was posted on Wings over Scotland on Saturday morning and I attach 4No Parliamentary Question Responses provided by Scotland's Deputy First Minister which all relate to the safety of this school.
I remember when the Parliamentary Question Responses were first issued, Bob Matheson of PCaW was shocked to find that we in Scotland could wait for many weeks to be issued with trash like this. Jackie Baillie MSP said: ''Well, that's what you get here'. Maybe so, but there is something wrong at Holyrood when all of our MSP's give-up so easily and leave their constituents hanging from the end of a rope like this.
I am copying-in the EIS teaching union as they may have responsibilities under the Health and Safety at Work Act. This Act is deliberately wide ranging and I have mentioned it several times before because they appear to be to be acccepting assurances given to them by Hub, the Scottish Government and Aberdeen City Council and I think it is fair to say that those assurances were expunged by experts a long time ago.
I have suggested the following as a route out of this, but it is for you to decide:
1. Scotland's Head of Building Standards to review the safety of this design and to provide design recommendations to all interested parties.
2. Suspend payment of pending and future invoices to Harper Macleod until they resolve this.
3. The ICE will review this case as an exemplar of how whistle-blowers are treated in Scotland.
As I understand it, you alone are responsible for the Devolution Settlement and if it is not working then you should be made aware of that. What I am reporting to you is incredibly serious and cannot just be passed-on to Hub, or Holyrood, or Aberdeen City Council as each is as culpable as the other at the moment and so they will do nothing and I think we all know that, don't we?
We therefore require leadership from the Secretary of State for Scotland. I believe that the process is now moving forward purposefully, whether that be due to input from youself or the ICE, or both, but what I can say is no-one is contacting me.
The Timeline I sent you last week shows how a similar but much smaller problem is dealt with by the Government of KSA. It's an example of proper respectful communication between engineers and it goes-on all over the world. You will agree that the Brimmond Timeline, as shown below, is absolutely shocking in comparison.
"Regarding the school that's sinking. It's being investigated right now; the suffocating grip of the Deputy First Minister and the City Council has finally been loosened and a proper investigation is taking place. I'm posting this so that people can read through it and make their own minds up. It was suggested I should put together a timeline; so here goes:
ReplyDelete1. August 2014: the Project Manager said before construction had started; 'you've made a mistake here; if you keep going that school will sink'. They sacked him and carried-on.
2. September 2014: The Project Manager told the City Council and their lawyers: 'This building will never work'.
3. November 2015: the school started to sink.
4. August 2016: 'Scotland on Sunday' questioned if the school was safe.
5. August 2016: Meeting with Scottish Building Standards to explain the design fault.
6. September 2016: The Scottish Government check the design and decide it is safe.
7. May 2017: leadership of the City Council, who built the school, passes from SNP to a Labour/Conservative alliance.
8. Early 2017: meeting of Holyrood MSP's at the Education and Skills Committee where they are told by Hub and Scottish Building Standards that the school is safe.
9. November 2017: 40No experts from the American Society of Civil Engineers question whether the school is safe.
10. May 2018: a series of meetings were convened jointly by Hub and the City Council with 16No Scottish experts along with construction lawyers from Edinburgh and Newcastle. They conclude that the Scottish Government are liable for the cost of rectifying the school.
11. July 2018: letter from the Deputy First Minister saying 'contact Hub regarding the safety of this school'.
12. November 2018: letter from Hub saying that 'they would not communicate regarding the safety of this school'.
13. January 2019: letter from the MSP from Dumbarton saying that the Scottish Government and the City Council are satisfied that the school is safe.
14. May 2019: meeting with Scotland's Head of Building Standards to explain the design fault.
15. February 2020: Secretary of State for Scotland is informed.
16. April 2021: Institution of Civil Engineers are informed.
The wrong decisions were made, weren't they? What happened to those that made the decisions because this will cost millions to fix? They were council employees, weren't they? They were promoted by the Deputy First Minister and they now work for him. What happened to the whistle-blower? He is long-term unemployed.
20-years ago this would not have happened in Scotland; things would have been properly checked straight away. Now we have cover-up, after cover-up, after cover-up and it is because everyone is answerable to those at Holyrood.
Sadly, it is London based professional institutions that are now sorting this out for us."
Dear Cheryl,
ReplyDeleteYou will find some of the previous correspondence relating to this case on the following site. Just scroll down the comments to the bottom and you will find the latest letter there. Most but not all of the other letters are preceeding.
My explanation of the Health and Safety at Work Act and how it may be applicable to the EIS in this situation was sent to Brian some time ago and nothing has changed since then.
We are in a position where one opinion on the safety of this school conflicts entirely with the other and a determination of which one is correct has to be made, either by Scottish Building Standards or by their appointed Consultant.
I really am at a loss to understand why everyone is finding this so complex.
Dear Mr Jack,
ReplyDeleteI copied the undernoted information to the EIS and NUSUWT teaching unions two days ago. If you scroll to the bottom of the comments section, the principal letters are copied there for all to see.
It is of course neither my nor George Laird's responsibility to provide this for you and perhaps you will want to ask those around you why it has been necessary. Can Scotland Office staff not just answer correspondence; like almost every other Government in the world does as a matter of course? It would save everyone a lot of anxiety.
The Timeline especially will concern you and this is the most concerning Timeline I can ever remember seeing; you could perhaps seek the Institution Of Civil Engineers' view on that as some items are really concerning.
The ICE have been involved in this case for the past 6-weeks or so. They no doubt work to a professional communications protocol which requires all correspondence relating to life-safety to be answered within 24-hours. The purpose of this is to ensure that situations like this one do not stagnate. We can see it working and we can now at last see progress towards a resolution. Everything I send to them is answered on the same day, sometimes well after working hours. I have referred all of you to this protocol several times before but it falls on deaf-ears. The HSE will abide by it too, but the Scotland Office, the Scottish Government, the City Council, Hub, teaching unions and the legal profession don't. Hence, public bodies in Scotland are not working and the public of course are being let-down by that.
I was able to name over 40No Scottish public-servants yesterday who have been involved in this case, some for over 6-years, and yet they will barely speak to me or answer an Email. It's as if they all want to do nothing whilst still being paid. George Laird and I don't get paid and yet we appear to have done more work to solve this than all 40No of you put together. I would ask you to understand that and to think about it for a while; it's not something that you should be satisfied with and it is not something the public should be accepting, is it?
Can I ask that you take this-up with Scotland's new Education Minister please? As I have said to you before, I will not be affected any longer by the negligence of the Scottish Government and their lawyers. This should have been resolved within weeks but has gone-on for seven-years and you can imagine how hugely damaging that has become and so I would ask you to understand that and to instruct it to be resolved and I would again suggest that you suspend payments to Harper Macleod until that is done; there's a good chance that the public would support a forceful solution such as this, but it is for you to decide.
Please let this be the last Email I have to write to you on this subject.
Dear Mr Jack,
ReplyDeleteUndernoted is a list which I produced earlier this week of all those who have been involved in this investigation over the course of the past 7-years. What strikes me is that it has not dented anyone's employment prospects; quite the reverse in some cases.
Some time ago, I sent many of you a reference to an American Society of Civil Engineers video, Ethics Case Study 2, on the Piper Alpha Disaster. That was caused when a handful of managers in Occidental's Aberdeen Office ignored expert opinion; an oil fire quickly turned into a gas fire which resulted in many fatalities. They should know about the Piper Alpha Disaster at Aberdeen City Council and Holyrood. It was one of the top three worldwide engineering disasters of the 20th Century.
In this situation we have here, you have been provided with expert opinion from the American Society of Civil Engineers and by the Institution of Civil Engineers and you cannot get any better than that. All that we are waiting for now, is your decision.
Parliamentarians -
Alister Jack
Nicola Sturgeon
John Swinney
Jackie Baillie
Ross Greer
Ross Thomson
Liz Smith
Mark McDonald
Douglas Lumsden
Education Scotland -
Euan Couperwhite
Gayle Gorman
Helen Shanks
Civil Servants -
Bill Dodds
Jonathan Moore
Stephen Garvin
Scott Johnson
Charlie Penman
Rob Polkinghorn
Councillors -
Jenny Laing
Barney Crocket
Hub -
Peter Reekie
Angeline Robertson
Frazer Innes
Lawyers -
Bruce Caldow
Professor Robert Rennie
Gary McAteer
Keith Bishop
Jane McMonagle
David Milne
Jonathan Barne
Teaching Unions -
EIS
NASUWT
Engineers -
Rod Manson, BuroHappold
Gillian Wright, Arup
Bradley Hall, WSP
Mark Stewart, ACC
Tony Cadrola, Cundall
PM/CM Management Consultants -
Ronnie Dool
Gardiner and Theobald
Turner and Townsend
Faithful and Gould
Contractors -
Ogilvie
Galliford Try
Morrison
Balfour Beatty
Robertson
Morgan Sindall
Van-Elle
Hulley and Kirkwood
Dear Mr Jack,
ReplyDeleteThe following was posted-up on Wings over Scotland yesterday; it's very short, but summarizes the present situation:
"Regarding the school that’s sinking: I understand that the Holyrood parliamentarians, their civil-servants and lawyers who are involved in the cover-up were named yesterday.
Just like the Alex Salmond case, none of them have lost their job. Not one. Some have even been promoted.
World experts said this school will never work in 2017. That has been added to in recent weeks by Scottish experts and yet we still have silence from all at Holyrood."
The ASCE video I referred you to late last week is referred below. You only have to to view the first couple of minutes to understand what it is all about: "people always think maybe we can ignore this and it will go-away". I have been making this point to all in Scotland for years and, believe me, it is hopeless.
On the wider point of whether this would happen elsewhere in the world; I personally think that would be unlikely. Most countries have a protocol in place which ensures they can be honestly and independently investigated straight away and everyone is protected. If it were to happen, in the USA for example, then many of the named individuals would have been replaced by now and some would be serving serious jail-time.
The Institution of Civil Engineers will be able to advise you on that.
Dear Hannah/Carol,
ReplyDeleteI received this from Jackie Baillie MSP earlier today. It is almost identical to the letters I received in 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019 and 2020 and so the Holyrood doom-loop continues.
Two things are apparent to me:
1. In September 2014, I told the Scottish Government's lawyers that I was a whistle-blower and that if they continued building this school, it would fail. As you know, I have been repeating this ever since but the message still isn't getting through, is it? If this is how whistle-blowers are treated in Scotland, by the Scottish Government, then that will concern the ICE and the Engineering Council. If this had happened in KSA or USA for example, then people would be in jail just now. That may sound like an exaggeration, but your colleagues will tell you that it is not.
2. In the American Society of Civil Engineers video I sent you at the weekend, it stated (near the end): "An engineer has a professional responsibility to put the safety of the public before their own career development and you cannot wash yourself of that responsibility". The ICE would no doubt recommend that their members do the same, but I would ask: "What are the responsibilities of Holyrood parliamentarians and their lawyers in this situation...when a whistle-blower has reported something to them and they have fail to investigate...fail to protect the whistle-blower...and the cost of that will be many millions of pounds?" That, I think, is the very essence of whether whistle-blowing will ever work in Scotland. Personally, I believe that the engineering institutions should be circumspect about assuming that what happens in England, from a legal perspective, necessarily happens in Scotland. It clearly doesn't; the protections do not exist and that doesn't seem to concern our parliamentarians, but it will concern the engineering institutions.
The letter is dated 17th May, which was John Swinney's very last day as Minister for Education. I understand he has now been replaced by Shirley-Anne Sommerville. Presumably this case will remain John Swinney' legacy responsibility, but it would help enormously if it were now to be taken off him and put in the hands of an engineering professional; perhaps Peter Reekie, CEO of Scottish Futures Trust? Obviously you cannot instruct that, but perhaps the Secretary of State for Scotland can?
I note that Stephen Garvin is not a member of the Institution of Civil Engineers. He is, however, the Head of Building Standards in Scotland and so it is his responsibility to lead this to a conclusion and I cannot see how he can avoid that. He can take advice from a consultant of course but he should lead it to a conclusion and be prepared to distribute that conclusion to all interested parties and to answer questions. That is his job - wouldn't you agree?
Therefore, my suggestion is that design recommendations are provided and communicated to all concerned by Peter Reekie and Stephen Garvin. Questions arising can be answered by Stephen Garvin.
ReplyDeleteIt's an unsatisfactory scenario to have John Swinney and the forty or so other parliamentarians, civil-servants, councillors and lawyers saying the building is safe, whilst we have forty experts saying the opposite. Going back again to the ASCE video: "people always think maybe we can ignore this and it will go away....". That was said by a engineering safety expert so I think that everyone should just accept that advice and dispense with opinion which is from unnamed Holyrood parliamentarians, councillors, civil-servants and lawyers. They are, as the ASCE would say, just trying to wash themselves of responsibility.
The Scottish Government are obviously trying to distance the ICE from these decisions and I think we can all understand why they are doing that. But, there comes a time when things have to be sorted out and it has been clear to me for years that this administration at Holyrood will not do that and so I think it falls now to the ICE and the Secretary of State for Scotland.
During my meeting on 17th August 2016 with Jonathan Moore and Bill Dodds, both introduced themselves as members of the ICE and Gary McAteer will confirm this. The visual inspection report upon which the Scottish Government's case relied was produced by a member of the Institution of Structural Engineers. Peter Reekie introduced himself as an FICE in front of the Holyrood Education and Skills Committee and the minutes of the meeting will confirm that. Membership of the engineering institutions has therefore been used widely by the Scottish Government as a means to avoid proper scrutiny and to, instead, tell some fairly blatent lies which have resulted in this tragic situation.
I have worked with many members of the ASCE and in this type of situation they pursue those who are accountable and they do it with great determination wherever they are in the world. Unfortunately, in this situation it is members of the ICE that will be primarily accountable, but that is the situation we are now in.
By copy of this to Alister Jack - I trust this example clarifies just what a disappointing administration you have at Holyrood. My own opinion on this, for what it's worth, is that if expert opinion was delivered to Aberdeen City Council and Hub in March 2018, by BuroHappold and by others, which confirmed that the school was non-compliant, then many people may be on the wrong side of criminal law at the moment.
Dear Hannah/Carol,
ReplyDeleteI contacted Aberdeen City Council before; the attached letter was sent to them by Jackie Baillie MSP on 2nd August 2018 and their reply was received some time later on 25th January 2019. I also attach a letter received from Hub which is written in very similar vein.
I am sending these to you to make the point that corresponding with Holyrood and with any council or public body in Scotland is useless nowadays. You have to do all of the investigative work yourself and no-one employed by our civil-service does anything. That's not the way it works anywhere else, but that's the way it works in Scotland where you are surrounded on all-sides by vested interests.
My view on this is that a senior member of the ICE is the only person who can adjudicate from here. I have suggested Peter Reekie as he has access to all of the opinion produced by Hub/Aberdeen City Council in March 2018 and he knows the history of this school very well. Matthew Rennie, Jenny Laing and John Swinney are just administrators who know very little about the subject and I do not know why we are all listening to them.
You may want to ask yourself: "Where else in the world would you see letters like this from a client body?" and my question to the ICE is: "Is this whistle-blower right, or wrong?"
If he is right, then I would ask you to provide assistance please to get this established and some instruction to our Holyrood parliamentarians on how the law works with regard to whistle-blowers, all over the UK.
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteRegarding Matthew Rennie's letter received on Monday and attached below. The Scottish Government are wrong here and I've explained this many times over the years, but I will do so again. The Institution of Civil Engineers are copied-in this time and they will understand the importance of what I am saying:
We are at the stage of accountability; who is accountable? The Scottish Government say that it is Aberdeen City Council. It is not, it is the Scottish Government who are accountable and I will explain this as follows:
Once Jonathan Moore issued his letters to me of 30th September 2016 and 7th October 2016 (attached), contractual liability for the design was removed from the Contractor and from the Council. That liability now rests with the Scottish Government. In practical terms, this means that the Scottish Government are liable to pay for all remedial works, for everything, even if that means that a new replacement school is required.
I warned Jonathan Moore at the time of the consequences of checking and approving this design, but he wouldn't listen. I find it extraordinarily frustrating that he has been moved sideways to a job where he can do less damage and I have been left unemployed. I think that is a situation that all at Holyrood really need to look at and make your minds-up what you all stand for.
Interestingly enough, Matthew Rennie is right in that the Scottish Government has no direct responsibility in the setting of standards. But, the Secretary of State can intervene at any time he chooses and this might be a good time to do that.
I have suggested that a member of the Institution of Civil Engineers takes over the role of checking this design. I have suggested Peter Reekie, but that is for others to decide. There is no need to vex over who is a member of the Institution of Civil Engineers and who is not. I am not a member and neither is Stephen Garvin, but I think it fair to say that both of us are competent to do the check. I have done it already and we are just waiting on Stephen Garvin and Peter Reekie.
Finally, if anyone at the Scottish Government/Hub has stated that BuroHappold have checked and approved this design and they have not, then I would expect BuroHappold to react very strongly to that. It is a worldwide company with a strong reputation.
Dear Mr Jack,
ReplyDeleteI received a reply from Jackie 10-minutes ago. She thinks that Jonathan Moore, Stephen Garvin and Peter Reekie intend to do nothing.
As I see it, there are two possible options:
1. Issue a written instruction to one of them to carry-out the work.
2. Commission an external consultant to carry-out the work.
I believe that the Institution of Civil Engineers has already carried-out some checks and so they may be able to assist here.
I spent 3-hours at a meeting on 23rd May 2019 with Stephen Garvin and he has since refused to communicate with me. It seems entirely plausable to me that the design is 'unstable' and therefore unsafe, that is certainly what I found.
It is a situation which crops-up in construction law courts all over the world: "Once you are made aware that something may be wrong, you have to investigate it; you do not wait for it to happen". So, there's a duty on all of us to have it investigated.
I therefore do not believe that anyone is in a position to refuse, but I'll leave that up to you.
Dear Jackie/Mr Jack,
ReplyDeleteI have just been advised that the Secretary of State for Scotland can request this information directly from Aberdeen City Council using the provisions of the Education Scotland Act 1980. There appears to be no need to route this request this via Holyrood.
Please make the Council aware that the accepted protocol for this is 24-hours between receipt of the request and delivery of the information.
Charlie Penman from Aberdeen City Council and Angeline Robertson from Hub commissioned BuroHappold's design check in March 2018 and so it has already been done and it is a check from one of the foremost engineering consultants in the world. The Council just need to issue it so that we can all see it.
It will also confirm whether the Scottish Government, Aberdeen City Council and Hub have lied to us about BuroHappold's conclusions and recommendations. I suspect they have and, as I said earlier, that would be incredibly serious and I'm sure you know that.
The general point I made earlier still stands and that is no-one is in a position to refuse to co-operate at the moment.
Dear Hannah and Carol,
ReplyDeleteYou will have seen yesterday's Emails to Jackie Baillie MSP and Alister Jack MP. Jackie's reaction is: "But no-one at Holyrood agrees with you". It never changes. Unfortunately, it is the advice of ICE members employed by the Scottish Government that allows her to say this and that is why I contacted you back in mid-April.
I am keen to expose these ICE members and if they have something to say, let's hear it. At the moment they seem to be protecting the backs of Holyrood parliamentarians and Holyrood parliamentarians are protecting their backs in return. It is what I call the Holyrood doom-loop and it has been going-on for years now.
I had originally thought that you had four members involved in this: Bill Dodds, Jonathan Moore, Peter Reekie and Stephen Garvin. According to the Scottish Government they may not all be ICE members but you will be able to check on that. I am being advised by two members of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE); both of them are consultants. Neither of them are lawyers but they are considered 'expert geotechnical engineers' by the ASCE and as a consequence of that they spend some of their time in construction law courts worldwide. They therefore have a measured outlook and can weigh this case against several other similar cases they have come across in the past.
Both are of the opinion that the confined artesian layers down to a depth of 5m have been cut-through and blocked. The clay-filled excavation is working as a clay-core dam at the upstream end of the site, resulting in the winter-time flooding and the effects of 'piping', 'boiling' and 'upwelling water' which can be seen from the photographs. It is not compliant with any Design Standard. Geotechnical failure has already occurred and structural failure will inevitably follow if the design is not corrected (and it may happen at some time in the future, even if the design is corrected).
In failing to comply with Design Standards and to have the site competently examined by an expert in 2015, when it was first reported, criminal law has already been breached by the Scottish Government, the Council and by Hub.
What surprises them is not the failure itself which, like me, they put down to a contractor's mistake. What surprises them is the reaction of the Scottish Government and the sheer number of professional people who are complicit in what is essentially a cover-up. Not only engineers, but lawyers too. They find it astonishing that this can go-on without it being properly checked. Jackie's response to this question is always: "Well no-one at Holyrood agrees with you". It's the perfect Catch-22, isn't it.
ReplyDeleteI understand that the ICE had this building examined by experts very recently. I don't know what your experts have reported to you, but this all sounds exceptionally serious to me.
As I have explained before, I have been left in this invidious position thanks mainly to the actions of Jonathan Moore, Bill Dodds, Stephen Garvin and Peter Reekie who, I believe anyway, are members of the ICE. Going back to the advice of the ASCE again: "An engineer has a professional responsibility to put the safety of the public before their own career development and you cannot wash yourself of that accountability". This advice applies to your members as well as it applies to me. So, my suggestion is that these gentlemen give us their explanation of this. If there is a more benign explanation than the one I have described, then just issue it please.
By all means pass this Email on to your experts and it will let them know the way I am thinking. How do we conclude this from here? I have suggested that the Secretary of State for Scotland instructs the release of BuroHappold's design review, which was produced by their Rod Manson, from Aberdeen City Council and I will give him the time to make-up his mind on that. From the ICE's perspective, I think it is absolutely essential that you get your house in order and realise that if your experts are now advising something which is entirely different to that already advised to both Governments by your Scottish Government team of engineers, then that situation should be corrected by the ICE and that should be done immediately.
Dear Hannah,
ReplyDeleteThanks for your quick response; it is most helpful. There are three parties involved here: myself, the ICE and the Scottish Government. Can we look at ways of resolving this quickly and transparently between all three parties? I have a suggestion:
The problem has arisen because of the letters and the visual inspection report attached. The Scottish Government keep referring to this information as if it is fact and cannot be questioned and, because they do that, Aberdeen City Council and Hub just do the same. As a result, we cannot move from the position we are in. I think everyone now knows and accepts that this information is incorrect, but many unsatisfactory outcomes have resulted from it and continue to result from it and so that is the crux of the problem.
This information was produced by members of the ICE and the Institution of Structural Engineers and so it is your responsibility to ensure it is corrected.
As I see it, this information should be withdrawn and replaced by a revised synopsis of the engineering position, written by the ICE members who are currently advising the Scottish Government on this and I believe that is Stephen Garvin and Peter Reekie. Basically, is the building compliant, or not? Unless and until this is done, I think we will all be wasting our time and the Scottish Government will continue to do nothing. They work strictly on the basis of engineering advice supplied to them by their technical team and what I am saying is that this advice is presently wrong and needs to be corrected. Do that and present it to them and then the action is with them.
If you go-back to the example from KSA which I sent you a while back. That was progressed quickly on the basis of a thorough examination and review of the information which had been submitted by the contractor's technical team and that was done within 24-hours. We have been waiting for nearly 5-years on these letters being reviewed. I have reviewed them, as have many members of the ASCE. But, we still don't have a review from the ICE and, without that, we are going nowhere.
It is a highly unusual situation we are dealing with here of course. I have never personally seen anything like it and maybe the ICE haven't either. However, I think to progress we should keep it simple and insist that your members at the Scottish Government just do their job and revise and reissue the information upon which the Scottish Government is relying. Once they do that, there is nothing to stop the Scottish Government resolving this immediately.
So, I think that the action just now is with the ICE. Once you are finished, the action is with the Scottish Government. Would you agree with that?
Dear Mr Jack,
ReplyDeleteI'm going to post the undernoted, which is self-explanatory, later today.
I don't know if you have requested the 2018 BuroHappold design review from Aberdeen City Council, but I would recommend you do that because it will reveal everything that you, and all the rest of us, need to know.
I received a message from Jackie Baillie MSP early last week which explained that she cannot do anything more because the civil-servants were refusing to co-operate. The civil-servants involved: Bill Dodds, Jonathan Moore, Stephen Garvin and Peter Reekie, take their instructions from Scottish Government Ministers John Swinney and Kevin Stewart who have recently been replaced and so no Ministerial instruction will be forthcoming. Can you clear this up please and ensure that a Scottish Government Ministerial Instruction is issued to these four gentlemen to review this design and produce a set of conclusions, as per the highlighted text below?
It was also explained to me that Bill Dodds retired from the Scottish Government in late 2017, but I understand that he is regularly employed as a consultant. Can you ensure that he contributes to this too as he played a very key role supporting Jonathan Moore? As I say below, if either of these gentlemen have mislead parliamentarians and the public with false information, then that is indeed serious.
I think we should get a clear set of conclusions ready and put in front of Holyrood parliamentarians early next week and it is Stephen Garvin's responsibility to do that. Once that is done, Holyrood can then act quickly.
The Institution of Civil Engineers understand the engineering and the concept of whistle-blowing. Not only that, but they understand that communication is essential to allow a proper investigation to take place. They may or may not fully agree with me, I don't know that, but they move this process forward in a professional way that no-one else is anywhere close to matching and I would ask everyone else to try and do as they are doing. Mistakes have been made long-ago and my suggestion is that we identify them now, get them fixed (if they can be fixed) and let everyone get-on with their lives.
Please let me know a timescale for this? As you will appreciate, I am now sick and tired of Emailing people who do not respond.
PLEASE DON'T PUBLISH THIS - I don't think this is going to go-on for much longer. Let me set-out the way it see this ending:
ReplyDeleteI want to see you compensated for your time and the use of your website. They are going to say to me: 'Internet bloggers don't really have a value....why don't you pay him'.
I'll say to them: 'I've already paid lawyers more than £50k over 7-years and lost a few times that in earnings and the lawyers have achieved nothing....we now have an outcome within a few months, thanks to George Laird and he so far hasn't been paid anything....hence, he has a value and it is very a high value'.
I intend to leave it to them to compansate you and I will not speak to them until I know that is done.
I will not be getting sucked into discussions about it; that's all I intend to say and I will leave the action with them.
I think there is probably sufficient interest in my situation to ensue that I will not be stiffed in terms of compensation, but I think you could be. Hence, they need to settle with you before they settle with me.
Think that over for a few days and let me know if you see any problems with that.
By the way, I have no interest in what you achieve and I don't want to know. I reckon most of it will be paid by Harper Macleod and so think about that too.
Can you post this, George?
ReplyDeleteRegarding the school that's sinking. The following are a couple of opinions from experts; they are from Directors of worldwide engineering companies. I have another 45No opinions and they're all more or less the same. Doesn't sound good, does it?
We're still waiting on the Scottish Government releasing their advice from Scottish experts. They've had it for 8 or 9 weeks now and still haven't released it. I cannot understand what's taking them so long, can you?:
1) "You need to protect yourself from future litigation. Drainage can exacerbate settlement. Fill will settle regardless. This is just a botched building job. Someone provided a specific foundation solution, but it was ignored. If you don't want to use expert advice, don't ask for it".
2) "What should the maximum design groundwater level be for a general site that needs to operate resiliently over many decades and against a changing climate? Unfortunately this question has not been addressed in any meaningful way either via guidance or by the professional institutions. It is a passion of mine to get this topic factored into all projects related to infrastructure and development otherwise we are being selective in how we appreciate risk".
450No kids attend this school every day. Make-up your own minds if you think this is an emergency, or not.
Jackie,
ReplyDeleteI posted the undernoted an hour ago. I would much rather not have to do this because it is an unpredictable environment as I'm sure you know, but it helps keep pressure on Mr Swinney.
I think I've got this right but have a look at it and let me know? As I understand it, Jonathan Moore needs to be instructed by a Minister to release the information and that Minister is John Swinney?
The specific information I am talking about is by Edinburgh Consultants Kaya Consulting and it contains all the information you, or anyone else, will need. There is a separate opinion from a retired Professor of Civil Engineering; I don't know whether he wants to release that, or not?
Seperately, I recommended the Secretary of State for Scotland instruct the release of BuroHappold's 2018 design review held by Hub, Aberdeen City Council, Brodies and Muckle LLP.
All of this information is immediately available. You just have to ask for it.
Kaya Consulting and BuroHappold should provide similar information - conclusions and recommendations. It is a complex problem to rectify now; my opinions contained some variation in approach and theirs' may too but it is very important that this information is released.
As you know, I think we have an unsafe building here and, when you are in that situation, you do not wait for lawyers. They just determine who pays and that comes later.
The information is all there Jackie and, for now, I think we just settle for getting it released ASAP. I hope I am wrong, but I'm expecting the information to be very worrying indeed.
When this is over I think we all need to look at this from the perspective of the professional engineer trying to do a professional job in Scotland because, whatever you have in place at Holyrood, it isn't working. This whole process is supposed to take days, not years, and that is the only way it works.
Dear Cheryl,
ReplyDeletePlan B is to report this to the Health and Safety Executive and they have the powers to get these reports released instantly. After they are released, your own engineering and safety experts will advise you on them.
If, for example, your teachers at the school have concerns regarding excess settlement of the ground or excess surface water during and after heavy rain, then that is indicative of the design problems I have been describing and there is, in my experience, never a benign outcome to this.
It is for you to decide what to do, but the situation under the Health and Safety at Work Act is that you are the representatives of the teachers and pupils at the school and so it would be for you to make this call. I cannot do it for you.
"Regarding the sinking school: Still no word from Mr Swinney and his 'Head of Outcome Agreement Unit'. We're expecting two, maybe three engineering reports to be issued; one by the Engineers who designed the school, another by an expert firm from Edinburgh and maybe another by a former Professor of Civil Engineering.
It's been a long wait, hasn't it - almost seven years? The trouble with these engineering reports is that Mr Swinney cannot redact them, he cannot submit a holding reply and he cannot submit blank pages either and so he's cornered.
It makes me wonder why he didn't just listen to and check the advice of the whistle-blower back in 2014. How much would it have cost to fix it back then, perhaps very little, perhaps nothing at-all and how much is it going to cost to fix now? Can it be fixed now?
Why doesn't someone just ask him: Is this school safe Mr Swinney...'yes' or 'no'? Is that not what Holyrood is supposed to be for?
If this refusal goes-on any longer, there is a plan B. Plan B was suggested to the Teaching Unions several months ago and it would give John Swinney, his 'Head of Outcome Agreement Unit' and the Lord Provost of the City Council 24-hours to get them issued".
Thanks Jackie -
ReplyDeleteDear Cheryl,
Take advice on this please. If these reports are not being issued by the Scottish Government then there is a reason for that. I suspect the reason is that the Scottish Government's experts are agreeing with my experts and, if that is so, then the immediate question we need answered is: 'Is this school safe'.
The EIS will be aware there is not a hope in Hell that Shirley-Anne Somerville is going to sort this-out and it really should be dealt with from now-on only by independent engineering and safety professionals.
As I suggested this morning, the Health and Safety Executive will initiate a resolution that we can all trust and they will start that within 24-hours and my advice is that you call them.
If the EIS cast their minds back to the Cole Inquiry of 2017 into the Safety of Scotland's Schools, I think that Professor Cole would recommend this too.
Dear Cheryl,
ReplyDeleteThis is the third email today and I appologize for that, but I should pass this information on which I received a short time ago: I've had each item of correspondance from the Scottish Government, Hub and Aberdeen City Council, received over the course of the past 6-years, reviewed by an overseas engineer who understands and can advise on legal responsibilities.
His advice is that this process can only be managed to a speedy conclusion by an agency outwith the control of either the Scottish Government, Hub or Aberdeen City Council. I have mentioned the Health and Safety Executive a few times now and they will ensure a complete step-change in communication between all of the parties involved and that still appears, to both of us, to be the best option.
If we are still being held-up by Scottish Government lawyers, and I assume that we are, then this is the one agency that will clear them out of the way for us.
There is an equivalent to the Health and Safety Executive in almost every country in the world and they should be the first port of call when the safety of a building needs to be assessed. In our case, they are the last port of call, but you will agree they are a much more sensible option just now than Shirley-Anne Somerville.
Let me add that this engineer found the communication I have received from these three bodies to be the most arrogant and obtuse he has found in any country in the world in over thirty years. I have spent years doing their job for them and they don't seem to realize that, do they.
Dear Cheryl,
ReplyDeleteI am advised that the undernoted, from 19th October 2020, addressed to the Teaching Unions and the Secretary of State for Scotland, is one of the key Emails which explains the respective duties.
As I understand it, the Scottish Government are responsible for all costs arising and the Contractor has been absolved of any responsibility. So, it doesn't matter how much the Contractor is harassed or persuaded at this stage, he will not pay. Why should he?
I am being advised by a senior member of the American Society of Civil Engineers; he is not a lawyer and his experience is with Civil Defence organizations worldwide, which are very similar to our Health and Safety Executive. If this is correct, then I am shocked by it and it makes me wonder who has been in charge of this process in Scotland and why are you not all aware of this?
He furthermore went-on to advise that this would be a Police matter by now in many countries in the world. In Scotland, we are not sending it to the Police, we are sending it instead to Shirley-Anne Somerville!
Can I suggest at this point that both the Teaching Unions and the Sectretary of State for Scotland take advice on this from Public Concern at Work and the Institution of Civil Engineers, if you haven't done so already. Both of these organizations have the expertise to solve this instantly and it is about time you understood that and started communicating with them.
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteCan you answer this please? The Institution of Civil Engineers will be able to advise you.
I'm not political in the slightest and so I would rather not post all the time like this. But, you will understand, I need and want this to be resolved now; there is no need for it to go-on any longer.
What I posted today was just a re-run of information I have given to you twenty-times or more over the years. There is nothing new here, is there? They understood it straight away and so I cannot see why all at Holyrood are finding it so complex.
What has happened in previous years is that you have all disappeared off for a 10-week summer holiday leaving me up in the air. Can you confirm that this will not happen again this year please?
Tannadice Boy says:
8 June, 2021 at 6:53 pm
@Captain Yossarian 6:31pm
You have put in some exceptional posts today. Engineering is in good hands in Scotland at the moment. I think you can answer your own question about Swinney and building standards. I am retired now and no longer have CEng status. But I in contact with many current practising engineers. So how many signatures do you need to get Swinney to publish the Engineering reports on the sinking school?. This is one of these issues that won’t go away. We don’t compromise on safety.
Captain Yossarian says:
8 June, 2021 at 7:18 pm
@Tannadice Boy – Thanks for that. I’ll ask the forensic MSP for Dumbarton if you don’t mind: ‘How many signatures do I need to get Mr Swinney to publish the Engineering reports on the sinking school?’
I’m not a natural contributor to this website and I expect you guessed that ages ago. However, the contributors have undoubted spirit and gumption and I expect that is one of the reasons Stuart Campbell was reluctant to give it up.
Personally speaking, I doubt if there is an engineer alive that disagrees with me, but I’ll give all at Holyrood, Scottish Building Standards, Aberdeen City Council and Hub the opportunity to prove me wrong.
Keep looking in, in the days ahead and I’ll let you know how I’m getting-on.
Tannadice Boy says:
8 June, 2021 at 7:38 pm
@Captain Yossarian 7:18pm
Absolutely I will look in. This is an apolitical issue. Your are from Glasgow and I am until recently from Dundee but with similar backgrounds. However we are both professionally engineer trained. And the discipline of an engineering degree course and subsequent development prepares you for this eventuality. I have got the tea shirt. I can’t tell you how many sleepless nights I have had over expensive design mistakes. Swinney is an Insurance salesman. The difference.
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteFollowing yesterday's advice from among others the Institution of Civil Engineers, can you proceed as follows and let me know the Scottish Government's position by the end of today please?
"To provide the BuroHappold design review of 2018 and the Kaya Consulting design review of 2021 into the safety of design of Brimmond School in Aberdeen".
If there is no progress, or insufficient progress, by the end of today then I will submit a formal complaint on the professional ethical conduct of Scotland's Head of Building Standards, Stephen Garvin, to the Institution of Civil Engineers and I will do that tomorrow.
On a general point; this is happening in Scotland and so the Scottish Government are responsible for it. It is a matter of 'public life-safety' and for that there is a 24-hour response time.
I would hope that the Deputy First Minister, Secretary of State for Scotland and the two Teaching Unions will find common purpose and coalesce to ensure that this information is made available without any further delay.
George - This is the cover-note to a complaint I have just submitted to the ICE. They will investigate quickly and I will be found to be either right, or wrong. So, it couldn't be simpler.
ReplyDeleteI have asked them to investigate two things: 1. If the school is safe, or unsafe. 2. The treatment of whistle-blowers in Scotland.
On the latter point, I have suggested that they stop encouraging engineers to do this in Scotland until Holyrood get a strategy in place which protects them.
Dear Adanna,
I worked on this last night and I am happy with the content below.
I have included Gary McAteer in the distribution of this Email; he's a lawyer but don't be alarmed by that as I haven't spoken to him for nearly 2-years but I copy him in on everything. He was at the Jonathan Moore meeting and so can read through this when he has time and can advise if there is anything he disagrees with.
There are two aspects to this complaint: Number 1 is that unless this site is drained of excess groundwater during winter it will fail due to subsidence and that will be the end of the school and you do not have to go beyond meeting minute number 1 to understand that. Number 2 is that whistle-blowing doesn't work in Scotland, no-one listens to you, and it is for the ICE to so something about that because it is inevitably going to end badly if you don't.
The basis of my complaint against Jonathan Moore is that misled me, Scottish parliamentarians and the public into believing that this is a safe and compliant school free from risk. It is not and I explain that below.
I have half a dozen photographs which I will send you later. So, I've kept it to a minimum and you do not have a huge volume of complex information to go-through.
I will need help to format it correctly and so-on but have a read through it and let me know what you think?
This would be best solved quickly and then the New Civil Engineer can run an article on how it happened and how it was rectified. That's where it belongs. It should to be taken out of the hands of the Scottish Government ASAP - that's for sure.
We have interest from an investigative journalist at The Times.
ReplyDeleteI've missed-out on the Professor by a few months. Was he not Scotland's expert on Solicitor's Negligence?......I think he was.
ReplyDeletePlease let Garry know that I received a message this morning from The Times asking for the ICE report when it arrives. I will send Garry the original message if he wants; let me know if he does?
ReplyDeleteThe way I see this we are on a timeline here and we have 3-weeks, 4-weeks maximum - that's to get this finished, not to get it started. That's the way the ICE see it too.
The way it works best is if I'm settled and working somewhere far away in the Middle East in 3 or 4 weeks time. The ICE report will be sent to me and I will send it to Gary. He can do what he likes with it and that will be the end of the story. I will not send it to anyone else and my settlement can be contingent upon that.
If I am not in the Middle East, but I'm still stuck in Helensburgh, then I will send it to The Times.
I think the ICE would be happy with that solution. We're in a mess but we need to be pragmatic. The ICE have seen worse than this, but they are backing-off just now and waiting for it to be settled.
That's both journalists up to date now - Kieran Andrews and Patricia Kane.
ReplyDeleteMy last message from the ICE was only a few days ago and they were intending to issue by the end of September.
All I need to know from Gary is, will my situation be sorted-out before then, or after?
Can you let me know please?
.......Sent an hour ago. I'll let you know what I hear back. Both journalists have been following this for years, 4 or 5 years. It all depends upon the ICE report. I think it will be even more critical than the ASCE opinions were. You can imagine what the fall-out from that could be.
Dear Hannah,
ReplyDeleteWe appear to be close to the end of this now and so allow me set-out the way I see it being concluded in the few weeks ahead:
When I first approached the ICE, I had already gathered evidence which indicated that this building was non-compliant due to a simple construction mistake. The Scottish Government had gathered evidence that it was compliant and we were in a stand-off position which had gone-on for nearly 4-years. It seemed to me that the Scottish Government's evidence was incredibly weak, but no-one was offering independent leadership, no-one was communicating and so nothing was getting done and no progress was being made towards agreeing who was right and who was wrong. Not all non-compliant buildings are are unsafe of course, but I have always thought that this one was and that is why I have persisted for so long. The ICE offered to provide expert opinion which will settle this; I stand ready to accept the ICE opinion and I presume that the Scottish Government will do the same.
Adanna, from the ICE, advised me last week that the expert opinion will be ready before the end of September and I presume that opinion will be sent to me. I propose to send it to Garry McAteer who is an Advocate lawyer and instruct him to send it to Fraser Innes, who is Operations Director at Hub North Scotland who led the Hub Client Consortium that built the school, with instructions that he distributes it to the other members of the Consortium. They are a large client body that have been building public buildings in Scotland for many years. They will understand the report and instruct any works which they deem necessary and so they can be left with the responsibility to do that.
That will be my involvement at an end. I will not be sending the ICE opinion to anyone, other than to Gary McAteer.
I sent the Law Society of Scotland an Email on 12th July 2021 entitled: 'Bruce Caldow, Harper MacLeod - Complaint of Professional Negligence' and that explains my opinion of where primary accountability for this situation should lie and it is not with any engineer and that is all I need to say on the subject.
I think that we all owe a debt of thanks to the ICE for realizing early-on that this required proper investigation by experts and for offering to do that for us. I believe that every communication I have had with the ICE over the past few months has been answered and that simple willingness to be accountable, honest and organized is what has now brought us to within touching distance of an end-date. No-one else would have done that. PCaW tried tirelessly but, like me, no-one was communicating with them, the clock was running down and it was looking more and more unlikely that they would be successful. If there was a willingness to engage honestly with PCaW and use their experience to achieve an outcome, then the initiative may-well have worked and I think it should have worked but, sadly, that never happened.
I have explained to Gary McAteer that my continuing involvement in this case is needless and I have asked that my situation be sorted-out by the Scottish Government prior to the end of September. The fundamental reason for this is that no-one can sustain the level of attrition that I have had to manage over the past 7-years without lasting damage being done to them and to their dependents and so it has to be ended for that obvious reason. This has got nothing to do with the ICE of course, but I am just letting you know that my involvement is practically over and I have requested a timeline be put together to ensure that my situation is settled and I would expect communication to that effect from the Scottish Government, via Gary McAteer, to begin this week.
Dear Stephen,
ReplyDeleteThank you for your email, and for your patience with my brief responses to you as I’ve let our processes unfold.
As ever, it is helpful to be sighted on your correspondence and forthcoming plans.
I’m glad that you’ve found ICE’s response to this matter to be satisfactory and I personally hope that the coming weeks and months offer you some reprieve; I don’t underestimate how significant this has been for you.
With best regards,
Hannah
Sounds like we're very close now, doesn't it. I'll keep you up to date as things happen.
Dear Hannah,
ReplyDeleteI received a message from Bob Matheson from PCaW this morning to say that he was back at work. He's Head of Advocacy there and he was personally involved with this case for more than 3-years. He was away on secondment and so has missed the last 6-months. This morning was therefore the first time he will have learned of the ICE and the Law Society of Scotland's involvement.
From my experience, he often sees things differently and he can un-lock situations and that is his role. The current situation is summarized in the trailing Emails and Sybille can appraise Bob of that? As you can imagine, he's entirely independent and his organization is trusted by the Engineering Institutions because of that. I am therefore confident that, between the ICE and PCaW, we will find a solution to this.
The problem Bob had before was that the engineering was always being disputed; I said one thing and the Scottish Government said the opposite. Bob may have taken a view on who was right and who was wrong and that's why he stayed involved in this case for so long. It is therefore a great relief to know that this has now been taken out of our hands; it is being determined by your experts and that decision, when it is made, will be final.
It's only fair to give him a week or so to think about this as he has many other cases to deal with as well as this one. I am confident though that he will assist us reach an outcome.
So, we are in the hands of two charitable institutions based in London. I hope someone sees the irony in this. They will solve this within days. Holyrood, sadly, is full of liars and I include Jackie Baillie in that description.
Still waiting but I understand we now have the intervention of John Swinney. He is intervening to save his own neck of course, not to ensure the safety of a school. Bob Matheson from PCaW was involved 6-months ago; he's been on secondment, but is back now and he will resolve this. It has been held up for 4-5 months by a Scottish Government QC; it has been held-up for political reasons I suspect. That's all QC's do in Scotland nowadays, isn't it.
ReplyDeleteDear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteBob Matheson from PCaW has returned from secondment and it looks like we are now close to solving this case. There will be a cost involved in doing that and I want to try and ensure that, as far as possible, it is correctly allocated. In many of these cases, Edinburgh Sick Kids Hospital for example, the cost just falls to the public without any real explanation as to why that is the case and we should seek to avoid that from happening this time?
As you will be aware, I have tried on several occasions to make a formal complaint to the SLCC/Law Society of Scotland regarding an allegation of Professional Negligence against Bruce Caldow of Harper MacLeod, but that appears to be impossible. My allegation has been dismissed impertinently, by both of these organizations, without any reasons given.
I made the complaint because the disclosures that I made to him in September 2014 regarding the safety of a school under construction were not acted upon in compliance with the following extract from the Public Interest Disclosure Act 1988 and, as a direct result of that, public safety has been put at risk in the intervening years and financial losses have occurred:
"43D
Disclosure to legal adviser.
A qualifying disclosure is made in accordance with this section if it is made in the course of obtaining legal advice."
I understand that Professor Lorne Crerar of Harper MacLeod was the only representative from a commercial law firm involved in Esther Robertson's 2018 review of the system of regulation for the legal profession in Scotland, but that doesn't give his law firm immunity from investigation, or immunity from sanction if it is warranted?
Therefore, can you advise me how I can take forward the allegation of Professional Misconduct against Bruce Caldow and should this be left to me to do; is this not a public interest investigation at this point, to be taken forward by Holyrood?
Secondly, I attach advice provided by the Institution of Structural Engineers and it couldn't be clearer: 'PCaW are the experts...they are independent....leave everything to them.' We do not have a structural engineering problem, but we do have a civil engineering problem and so I have alerted the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE), but their advice is similar.
Therefore, the situation at the moment is that we are waiting on a determination on the safety of the design of the building's foundations by experts from the ICE, and PCaW will suggest a fair outcome based upon their considerable experience and reputation.
Hence, almost all of this problem has been taken out of your hands. What remains a Scottish Government problem is who will pay for this and I suspect the answer to that question lies in the willingness of the Scottish Government to investigate their own private sector lawyers? There hasn't been any willingness to do that in the past, but perhaps there should be now?
Can you take advice on this and answer it urgently, as I am aware that there is some pressure to have this resolved now and, with winter approaching, I can understand that.
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteMy experience has been that if a situation like this were to arise in most overseas countries then the consequences of it would be extraordinarily serious. What you are saying is, that in Scotland, no-one communicates and so nothing gets done....is that it? Forgive me, but that sounds utterly putrid.
I include the Teaching Unions and the Secretary of State for Scotland in this Email as they have specific responsibilities and yet they too are electing to do nothing.
If there is an accident, then you only have to look to the Grenfell Inquiry to see what the consequences of that are for all of those who are aware and who do nothing and I have stated this many times over the years, haven't I? If there is an accident, the situation changes instantly.
PCaW and the ICE are professionals and if they are not assisted by Holyrood then they will come to a determination anyway. Thankfully, that's the way it works.
My opinion, for what it's worth, is that Harper MacLeod are bound by a Professional Ethical Code and the public trust them and pay them because of that. If their conduct falls foul of that Professional Ethical Code, then they are due to be investigated and I think that should start now. I don't think anyone would disagree with that?
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteAs I say, the safety of the design of the school's foundations will be determined by the experts of the ICE, in conjunction with PCaW and I think that situation has been accepted?
All that I need assistance with is submitting a formal complaint of Professional Negligence against Bruce Caldow of Harper MacLeod. The Law Society of Scotland will not allow me to do that and they haven't explained why.
1. Will this assist me? - No, it probably won't.
2. Should this be pursued in the public interest? - Yes, I think it should be.
Why should we allow ourselves to drift into another Edinburgh Sick Kids Hospital scenario where many millions of pounds of public money is handed-over needlessly? What I am suggesting Holyrood do is investigate this law firm; you may find that I have been right all-along?
At the stage we are at now, it matters little what Holyrood decides to do or not do as the outcome will largely be decided by others. All that I am suggesting Holyrood do is look to determine accountability, because that is what the public will be looking for from Holyrood. Wouldn't you agree?
My complaint to the Law Society of Scotland was sent on 12th July and you have a copy of it.
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteI received the following advice some time ago from an American engineer and it may help at the moment. He is regarded as an expert witness in construction law courts worldwide on the subject of geotechnical engineering and his legal advice has proven to be sound:
Two things will be resolved before the end of this month:
1. What has to done to return the school to compliance? This will be advised by the ICE.
2. Who has liability for costs and safety? This currently lies with the Scottish Government.
Due to the Scottish Government letters of 30th September and 7th October 2016 attached, it seems unlikely that you will be able to recover any costs from the Contractor, but maybe we can be proven wrong on that?
The purpose of the trailing Emails is to give the Scottish Government the opportunity to pass liability for costs over to Harper MacLeod and their insurers. Whether or not you want to do that is for you of course, but there would be a public expectation that you try to do it?
I understand that my complaint to the Law Society of Scotland of 12th July, contains the information required to get this process started and that information was copied to you.
Harper MacLeod have been dealing with this case for 7-years and you have been dealing with it for 5-years and we have little over two weeks to conclude everything. I think that something needs to change and very quickly, wouldn't you agree?
Can I suggest that this information is passed-over to the Scottish Government's principal law officer and you ask her to advise you? She will be aware that, unless something is done quickly, the Scottish Government may soon be faced with an unexpected cost and that would be needless.
Please respond today Jackie and let everyone know what you plan to do?
Dear Mr Cooper,
ReplyDeleteCan I suggest that the EIS lend a hand at this point? I recall when Edinburgh Sick Kids Hospital was rectified, it was done largely due to the efforts of the Union, UNISON.
It is obvious that the next two weeks will be crucial; I cannot do everything on my own and nor should I be expected to. Your support in motivating all at the Scottish Government at this time would therefore be most helpful.
Dear Mr Jack,
ReplyDeleteThe under-noted was sent last night and is I think a fair reflection on the current situation.
After 7-years, the only organizations that can be trusted to be honest and accountable are the Institution of Civil Engineers and Public Concern at Work; both are registered charities, headquartered in London. Would you agree that's a fair summation?
What your Administration at Holyrood and their lawyers have been doing and are doing at the moment is anyone's guess.
As you can see, I want to have my situation resolved now as I've had enough of this.
Hi Unknown
ReplyDeleteI won't publish your tweet, but I would say in response to it that I thought I saw a physical change in the person you mention, and wondered if it was cancer or something equally serious. Last time I met that guy was in Inverclyde at the by-election.
George
Bob,
ReplyDeleteI should have attached this with my previous Email:
To: Bruce Caldow, Harper Macleod
Date: 13th September 2014
Bruce,
Ogilvie's final letter to me was dated 10th September. These photographs were taken on 11th September and show that the process of subsidence has already started. The cracks in the soil in then foreground of each photograph mark the edge of the 5m deep trench which was excavated in the search for contamination. No contamination was found, but the soils within these trenches will now be subject to 'inundation, soil collapse and subsidence'. What you are seeing now will worsen during the winter months when the water table level rises and the moisture content of the surface soils increase. The consistence of the soils within the trenches will soften to the extent that, in places, the soils will have the consistency of a slurry. It is therefore dangerous and it should be recognised, discussed and recorded now. These photographs will allow this process to get started.
As the letters show, I have discussed this over numerous iterations with Ogilvie's senior management. There is no recognition from them, either in writing or verbally, that there is a problem and so they have no intention of putting any remedial actions into place. Ogilvie's Construction Director appears to have an entrenched view that subsidence will not occur. Experience shows that in situations like this either nothing is done by the contractor, or some reluctant and half-hearted remedial work is done at the last minute which will not solve the problem.
Aberdeen City Council's geotechnical advisers are Fairhurst and Partners. They will understand what has happened and they will be able provide independent advice to Aberdeen City Council.
From my personal point of view, I wanted to resolve this as an employee of Ogilvie and I wanted to finish the project and ensure that it was successful. 'Whistleblowing' is not therefore something that I chose to do, but something that I have been forced into doing. How else can I deal with an employer like Ogilvie? Surely employees should be able to raise concerns about engineering (especially on government funded projects) without fear of being of being terminated on the fabricated grounds of 'poor communication skills'.
It couldn't be any clearer. could it?
Bob,
ReplyDeleteI found the final letters at the weekend. Because they are from so long ago, I had filed them away and so it has taken some time to find them. They are item 3 below - the PDF file.
So, we now have a total of three letters from myself to the Contractor and three replies, all occurring over the period 5th August - 10th September 2014 and all are attached below. Letters were evidently never going to work and so I went to see Bruce Caldow of Harper MacLeod a fortnight later on 23rd September; I handed the letters over to him and asked him to ensure that it was professionally checked by Fairhurst as I was certain that it wouldn't work. Sadly, we now know that, for whatever reason, he didn't do that.
The important point from the attachments is that Hugh Mallett is BuroHappold's UK expert on contamination and hydrogeology. He obviously had the same concern I had with the way work was being handled on site and so he produced a report (referred to in the letter) which made the following recommendations:
1. There is no need to search for contamination at depths greater than 1.0m.
2. Disturbing the ground at depths of greater than 1.0m will alter the hydro-geological equilibrium of the soil.
He was in agreement with what I have been saying for the past 7-years. Nigel Turner from Fairhurst provided the same advice a year earlier and, in 2017, we heard the same advice again, this time from a whole range of international experts. We are just waiting on a final determination this time by the ICE and I have to ask why we need all of this? Why can't they just investigate properly and do it right in the first place?
When I returned from holiday and learned that they had excavated to a depth of 5.0m right across the full width of the site I developed a concern that the building would no longer work; not only that but it would be unlawful to try and I made that point several times to Bob Gray and it was that which brought about my termination a week later. I think that is all explained in the attachments.
I do not have a copy of Hugh Mallett's report but I read it at the time and it supports what I have been saying. I spoke to him by phone in the week prior to being terminated by the Contractor and he's a respected engineer who is willing to help. Can I suggest that someone speaks to him?
What this tells me is that the Client has proceeded to build a school that he was told would fail; he has seen it fail and he refuses to accept that because of the political fall-out that would ensue.
After 5-years I think it is unlikely that my MSP will do anything further. So, from here this either gets resolved quickly or I will take it to the press. I will not stand by and have my life ruined by a delinquent Scottish legal and political fraternity and I will go to the press rather than let that happen.
It has been suggested many times over the years that I am involved in a personal campaign which is not supported by anyone else and the attachments (1-4) identify some of the people who have been saying that. In the case of the DFM, he appears simply to be stating an untruth, doesn't he. We are just waiting on the final opinion from the ICE but, had it not been for my efforts, then this building and those who use it every day would have faced an uncertain future and, as things stand at the moment, I do not think there is any doubt about that.
Please don't take this personally as both yourself and Hannah Smith of the ICE are the only people trusted to deal with this honestly but, I'm sure you will understand, I have reached the end point with Holyrood, their lawyers and all the rest of them. Isn't it concerning that, in Scotland, members of the public have to do this amount of work while all they can do is complain at the number of Emails you are sending? It strikes me that there a lot of people kidding themselves here that that it's all going to work-out for them in the end. That does not seem at-all likely to me.
Bob,
ReplyDeleteI found this last night; it is the agenda for the final meeting and I referred to this meeting in my letters. Those in attendance were from BuroHappold, the Architect and the Contractor.
You will see that Hugh Mallett's report was discussed. He was a senior guy, an expert engineer, who everyone, including the BuroHappold Directors, respected and followed.
His advice was basically: 'Don't look for any more contamination; it's pointless, very expensive and you'll just risk destabilizing the site'. Everyone had seen Hugh Mallett's report, including the Hub team. I didn't give it any special attention during the meeting because I expected everyone to just do as he had recommended and there was no indication at the meeting that they weren't going to do that.
Hence, if we are provided with this report then I think this will be answered. It makes you wonder why we have been given a succession of visual inspection reports up until now doesn't it, when this is available and someone of his standing in the industry and specific knowledge of this site has been by-passed?
What happened is that the Contractor did the opposite; dug bigger and deeper trenches over the next fortnight than had been allowed before, back-filled them with clay, and what we have been seeing are the consequences of that. It may be the case you know that there was a perceived profit motive; there usually is.
Bob,
ReplyDeleteI issued the agenda on 7th July 2014; that was 7-days or so before the meeting and so the meeting will have taken place on or around the 14th July. I then left for annual holiday. Hugh Mallett's report had been issued in the week before the agenda was issued and so that would have put its date of issue on or around the first week of July. These dates tie-up pretty well to the dates on the letters, don't they?
If we give those at Holyrood and their lawyers another 50-years they will not answer this and there's a reason for that, isn't there. I think Hugh Mallett will answer it instantly. 'When you don't do as I tell you.....when you do the opposite.....this is what happens'.
My memory of Hugh Mallettt is that he is the antidote to the obtuse folk you have been dealing with until now.
Bob,
ReplyDeleteAttached is the advice of the Institution of Structural Engineers. This was given to me while you were on secondment and it explains the way it is supposed to work in engineering.
As you can see, it is between PCaW and the Engineering Institution. I have already gone to the ASCE for opinions and they are as big an Engineering Institution as you will find and that wasn't accepted by either Holyrood, Scottish Building Standards, Aberdeen City Council or Hub. I personally think it should have been accepted as it would have saved us a lot of time.
I have now gone to the ICE and I think we are all agreed that their opinion will be accepted? There may be those who think the two opinions will be completely different, but I cannot say that I'm one of them. Anyway, that opinion is due sometime within the next couple of weeks and that will be the end of it.
The problem is that I went to Harper MacLeod first, instead of to PCaW. Should that be such a big problem? I did that because they were the Clients legal representatives and I wanted to inform them instantly that something was going badly wrong and I think I made that clear? Harper MacLeod's function appears to have been to tie me in knots, take money off me and keep me silent ad-infinitum. Would that be a fair summation of their role?
If your efforts at finding a solution are being hampered by this company, as mine have been over the years, then let me know please? If they are not helping, then they can be cleared out of the way and I copy this Email to the parliamentarians and Teaching Unions who can help facilitate that. I remember when you first looked at this case you thought it would be sorted out very quickly and so somebody is preventing that and they should be identified and removed.
I don't know if either yourself or the ICE has had the opportunity to speak to Hugh Mallett of BuroHappold? He understands this site very well and we should take the opportunity of consulting with someone who is an undoubted expert? He will either agree with me, or disagree and it may not take him long to make his mind-up and tell you. In fact, he may be able to do that almost instantly.
As I see it, the action will soon be with PCaW to propose a resolution to this? Personally speaking, I would rather have this resolved by PCaW than by anyone else and I think that your honesty and resourcefulness under the most difficult of circumstances over the past three years deserves recognition by those who are copied in to this Email.
I think it is fair to say that if it wasn't for PCaW, then this case would have been covered-up long ago.
Gary,
ReplyDeleteI sent this attachment for the first time last week; I only found it recently and I want to point-out several things to you. I have set-out most of this before but, as new evidence comes to hand, I should explain how it fits-in. This was the last meeting before I left for holiday in the summer of 2014 and I was handing over to Ogilvie's Douglas Jack for the next fortnight; BuroHappold were at the meeting too. It took place on or around 14th July and it was a normal hour-long meeting.
I handed over several items, the most important was 4/5, the test results for the "formation", which is the level platform of ground on top of which the school was to be built.
The file of test results stood about 30mm high on the meeting room table, so it was thorough, probably two hundred or so pages in total. It was test results for a number of soil properties, but the most important was "bearing capacity", which is the strength of the soil, and "moisture content". BuroHappold studied the summary of results and said they would respond formally later.
Item 4/3 was the report from Hugh Mallett from BuroHappold which said: "No more digging for contamination without proper authorization; there's hardly any contamination there; what do you think you are doing; you have already done enough damage and cost enough money; stop now." The report was brutal and so I didn't spend long discussing it at the meeting. I did say that the search for contamination was over - "finished" and everyone accepted that. Digging for contamination had been a bone of contention for several weeks; Myself and BuroHappold wanted it to stop and Ogilvie wanted it to continue. What their motivation was is anyone's guess, although I presume it was seen as profitable. There had been contaminated soil there but it had been removed weeks ago and the soil that remained was not contaminated and it was at sufficient depth for it to be harmless. Just leave it alone. I think the letters I provided last week cover this pretty well and, if you read Hugh Mallett's report, he makes it abundantly clear. I don't know how much money was wasted on this, but it seems likely to me that it was a high six-figure sum, or possibly more. Bill Dodds of Scottish Building Standards told us at the 2016 meeting that Ogilvie paid for this themselves (item 24); that may be so but the Client was paying for it while I was there.
To build a school you need to dig holes whether that be for foundations, drains, water mains or whatever else. The important point is that when you fill in the holes back in again, you use granular material (gravel) wherever you can to allow drainage. That allows the moisture content of the soil to remain stable because water never builds-up and, if you do that, the bearing capacity will remain stable.
It had been a difficult site in terms of soil conditions but, at the point we were at, the work was finished, it had been tested and so let's forget about contamination and carry-on and build the school. This was agreed at the meeting and BuroHappold will confirm that.
Instead, Douglas Jack spent the next fortnight digging the 5m deep trench looking for contamination and the problem is that he filled it back in again with clay, which has turned it into a huge dam that is flooding the site each winter. You know all of this of course. Hugh Mallett had just advised us not to do that, but Douglas Jack had gone-ahead and done it anyway. As a result, the moisture content has risen and the bearing capacity has dropped, the ground conditions have been re-set and the test results I handed over at July's meeting no longer apply. These test results, if carried-out now, would be entirely different - the moisture contents would be much higher and the bearing capacities much lower; the building is hanging-on for now only because it was designed with a healthy Factor of Safety.
When I returned from holiday and complained that the work done in my absence was wrong and that the school design would never work, I was terminated and the letters explain that. Gavin Frazer, the Site Manager, complained in the days before I returned and he was also terminated. This is the point at which Bruce Caldow was asked to intervene and investigate and if he had done that at the time, the investigation would have been straightforward and the problem would have been solved. We later found-out that he had consulted with the Contractor and with accountants, not with any engineer, and that's specifically what I asked him not to do.
ReplyDeleteOne thing that everyone should keep in mind is that Contractors will lie to you. Get things checked by independent experts straight away and that's the only way these problems can be managed. Professor Cole told us this, didn't he? Bruce Caldow was asked to do that and paid to do it but he did nothing. He therefore deserves all that is coming to him and I think that would be the public expectation too.
As I explained to Natalie on Friday, I have given-up years of my life to this and my only concern now is removing myself from it. I am content that the hundreds of Emails that I have sent-out are honest and are verifiable with the opinions we have from the ASCE and the one we are soon to get from the ICE. The case should be turned-over to someone else now; someone with public responsibility and the authority to get it finished.
This may take years to sort-out and so please ensure that I am removed from it now - this week. You have all of the information you require and it is for the Scottish Government, Scottish Futures Trust, Hub North Scotland, Aberdeen City Council, Harper MacLeod, Scottish Building Standards, BuroHappold, Faithfull and Gould, the EIS and Ogilvie Construction to sort through it, agree a solution, agree who is liable for costs, and manage it from here. To put it bluntly, these are the people who have been paid to do it right in the first place and they have failed. Neither myself, the American Society of Civil Engineers or the Institution of Civil Engineers have these responsibilities; we have not been paid; we have assisted because we are professionals and no-one else was prepared to do it. It is a situation which is so negligent and so delinquent it is unparalleled in my experience and I have more experience of this than most.
Each time I explain this, I have a different layer of evidence but I am still ignored. The ASCE are ignored too and I don't know of any other country in the world where that would happen. Will the ICE be ignored? I don't think they will be and so the game is up for Harper MacLeod. I have been left with no alternative but to turn to two of the largest and most respected Professional Institutions in the world for help and, fortunately for all of us, they have both responded. Maybe this shows what the modern Scottish legal profession has turned into; when they are the problem all of a sudden and not the solution?
Let me know Harper MacLeod's response please but if they continue to refuse, then it may be prudent to simply stop paying them and that will be a decision for those at the Scottish Government. I have suggested this many times before simply because I have never known it not to work. It's a last resort of course but it is effective in most countries and I think there would be a public expectation that it would be used here too.
Bob Matheson has been back now for the past few weeks and his focus is on assisting me and he may need some help with that. Fixing the school can be left to the public bodies and their private sector partners listed above.
I think that what I say above is clear, but let me know if there is anything else that either yourself or anyone else requires? If Jackie Baillie wants to pass this information on then she can as there are no Chinese walls which prevent this from being done. I'm sure you will agree that it is an outcome we are looking for now.
Dear Anon,
ReplyDeleteIf there is any comment on this thread you are unhappy about appearing, please get in contact and tell me the date and time, I can then scroll down and delete, sorry if this has caused offence or upset to anyone.
Have you considered writing a guest post on the blog?
George
Have a look through this yourself George but I think this should be published.....I have a high regard for the ICE but this has been a great disappointment.
ReplyDeleteDear Adanna,
There is no need to reply to this, but I copy-in all interested parties simply because proper communication is essential just now.
I have spent much of the past 7-years corresponding with various organizations about the safety of this building design and it is now time that I was provided with some assistance. It is not for individual members of the public to investigate these cases on their own.
I decided to release this information, principally to Bob Matheson of PCaW and Brian Cooper of the EIS, so that they can decide for themselves whether the ICE response is satisfactory. Since it was issued, I have spent much of the time wondering how it could be so entirely different to the opinions offered by members of the ASCE? Are the 40No expert engineers from the ASCE wrong?
I sent a few Emails to you yesterday explaining the role of visual inspection reports and the report we are talking about was provided by Ramsay and Chalmers. These were criticized by the 2017 Cole Inquiry into the safety of Scotland's schools and that is explained in the highlighted section of the original complaint, below. These should not be relied upon and that was explained by Professor Cole in his Report and the relevant section, 3.8.6, was sent to you on 11th June. (copy attached below). So, that has been made clear?
Your response (attached, password jm290921) doesn't answer the complaint, does it? An allegation of Professional Misconduct would, I expect, hinge around ethical standards 1 and 3 but you do not appear to have looked at that aspect of the case; in fact, you haven't looked at any aspect of the case, have you?
Unless we establish who is right and who is wrong, we are never going to resolve this. The ASCE engineers have done that already; it is not complex and it doesn't take long to do it properly. According to the ICE, Jonathan Moore is right and according the ASCE he is wrong. I think he is wrong too and I say that based purely on engineering and my expectation of the ethical standards of an engineer. It's an astonishing situation really, but I would invite everyone to make-up their own minds based upon the information set-out below.
I have advised the Teaching Union they would be best to get this design checked by a firm of independent Geotechnical Engineers and that should be done before the on-set of winter weather. I have provided them with the opinions of ASCE members and with Fairhurst's Soil Investigation Report. There is no need for anyone to visit the site; it is a desktop exercise with some input from the teachers at the school.
ASCE case studies 2 and 4 are referred to below. Both describe how avoidable tragedies are often the most devastating because problems just get covered-up, they deteriorate slowly and unseen and failure occurs suddenly. This explains the way another Professional Engineering Institution approaches a similar problem to the one we have at Brimmond School and it is entirely different, isn't it. These case studies are well-grounded, presented by experts, and help to inform the current situation we are in.
When this is over it may be prudent for the ICE to meet with Bob Matheson from PCaW and he can explain that whistle-blowing investigations should take place within hours, or days, communication should take place within 24-hours and an outcome reached within 1-month and that's the way it works for everyone.
I have suggested that this investigation should be taken forward from this point by the Teaching Unions in conjunction with their members who work at the school. That may be the most pragmatic and the quickest way to achieve an early resolution? I know that Bob Matheson of PCaW has offered to assist the EIS in the past and I presume that offer remains open?
Dear Mr Swinney,
ReplyDeleteI am trying to get this resolved so that we can all move-on. We are currently waiting on Aberdeen City Council and the question was asked on Monday: 'How long should it take Aberdeen City Council to respond?' I attach a few highlighted pages from the 2017 Cole Inquiry into the Safety of Scotland's Schools, which answers this question.
Page 62 explains that it took the Leader of Edinburgh City Council less than a day to come to a decision. So, that's all it takes. That Council convened a meeting with their Building Standards team, reviewed the information, listened to expert recommendations and came to a decision within hours.
For the previous 4-5 months, Edinburgh City Council had been receiving 'visual inspection reports' from the PFI Consortium and they were becoming increasingly skeptical about these reports. They were later found to be misleading and Professor Cole recommended that they stopped being used in Scotland. But, they are still being used and that alone has held-up progress for more than 5-years in this case.
We now have the expert opinion. Contractually, it is only the opinion of BuroHappold that is required and that is an engineering opinion, not a visual inspection report. So, all that we are waiting-on is the meeting between the Council and their Building Standards team. Can you advise when this meeting is due to take place please?
If I can make one final point: In the days of PFI there was always a clear distinction between the PFI Consortium and the Council. There is not that clear distinction between the Hub Consortium and the Councils and, in fact, there are occasions where the Hub Consortium have told the Council how to respond and the attached letter demonstrates this. Personally, I think that this is the wrong approach from any public interest perspective, but that is for you to decide.
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteI received an automated response from the Scottish Government yesterday promising a reply within 30-working days. I don't know how many times I have had to reiterate this over the years, but we are working to the Health and Safety at Work Act, which requires a response time of 1-day. That response should be provided by an expert engineer, not by Matthew Rennie.
The worked example I sent you shows that responses from the Saudi Director of Public Security were delivered on the same day to his team of expert engineers. This is a convention which has been accepted for many years because it complies with the law and it works. There is a duty to 'take seriously' any threat to safety within the public realm and worldwide precedent requires a 1-day response time, not '30-working days'.
I have not copied-in Hannah Smith from the ICE, but if you would like to check that with her as the ICE know more about this than anyone? This is amateur stuff Jackie and if Holyrood, Hub and their lawyers cannot get this right after 7-years then you have to wonder if this administration is fit for purpose?
I attach John Swinney's letter to you of 20th December 2017 in which he says that BuroHappold have refuted my claims. BuroHappold are the only party with design liability and so, at this stage, they stand alone as being the engineering consultant whose opinion matters more than that of anyone else. They are a world-leading engineering consultancy and they can handle situations like this calmly, quickly and with honesty.
I have read BuroHappold's expert opinion. It was produced by their Technical Director, Hugh Mallett and it agrees with everything I have said over the past 7-years. So, it would appear that John Swinney is simply stating an untruth and you will be aware of the seriousness of that.
I copy this to John Swinney so that he is immediately aware of his obligations under the Health and Safety at Work Act. It may be the case that he issues his reply to you and you issue it to me? That appears to be the Holyrood system? I would only reiterate that this is a 'life safety' issue and so it takes precedence, especially as the school is re-opening and we are now heading into winter.
Can you ensure that his response is delivered by Tuesday 19th October? All that is required is a short covering letter by Mr Swinney enclosing Hugh Mallett's opinion on the 'as-built' design of Brimmond School. This opinion is very clear and it will leave you in no doubt that this is an unsafe building which will not last.
I lot has gone wrong over the past nearly 4-years since Mr Swinney issued his letter and it can all be stopped tomorrow. When the Health and Safety at Work Act is respected by foreign governments, but not by Ministers of the Scottish government, then the public perception of that will be entirely negative and rightly so.
I have not copied-in the Teaching Unions but you may wish to keep them informed as they too have responsibilities, as 'Employees', under the Health and Safety at Work Act? I explained these responsibilities to the EIS in October last year and so they are aware of them.
Dear Mr Swinney,
ReplyDeleteI received 3No automated responses from the Scottish Government on Tuesday night indicating that replies will be issued to me. No date was given but the attached photograph is from 8th November 2016 and so I don't need to explain to you how urgent this matter now is?
1. The first reply should be by an expert engineer; that can be either Scotland's Head of Building Standards, or Aberdeen City Council's Head of Building Standards. Both were been provided with my information in 2019 and the purpose of that response will be to explain whether the school is safe, or not.
2. The second reply should be by yourself and the purpose of that will be to provide the design checks by Fairhurt and BuroHappold which you refer to in your letter attached. The visual check by Ramsay and Chalmers you refer to has been withdrawn? As I have stated before, I understand this letter to be untrue.
3. My situation remains unresolved and I hold the Scottish Government and Harper MacLeod responsible for that. I believe that both have mislead me since 2014 and, in doing so, have mislead the public. I am therefore leaving it to you to resolve this and your response should advise what the Scottish Government and Harper MacLeod propose to do to rectify this.
The safety of the school is now a matter for the Teaching Unions, Aberdeen City Council and the Scottish Government and I cannot do any more.
I presume that both responses will be issued to Jackie Baillie; can you advise when they will be issued?
Finally, you will be aware that many engineering experts have provided opinion on this school design on behalf of myself and on behalf of Jonathan Moore of the Scottish Government, Charlie Penman of Aberdeen City Council and Angeline Robertson of Hub. The information is therefore complete. I issued my information in 2017 and I am now asking you to issue yours.
I feel it necessary to set-out the information required like this as previous responses have been by Matthew Rennie/Scott Johnston and they have been a waste of everyone's time
Dear Ms Laing and Mr Swinney,
ReplyDeleteThe 'ponding issue' is illustrated by the attached photographs. This is caused by a 'hydraulic failure' which, according to Design Standard EC7, is the precursor of a 'structural failure'. The ground in this area has collapsed by about 350mm and if that had happened under the building, then the structure would have failed by now. The fact that it hasn't failed is due only to good luck. The second photograph shows that water inundation affects large areas of the school after wet weather and so it is not one isolated area that is affected. I have had to reiterate this many, many times over the years, haven't I? This is what happens when multiple confined artesian layers are suddenly blocked with clay; it was always going to happen and your legal team, Harper MacLeod, were warned about it before construction even started. When it became clear that Harper MacLeod weren't doing anything about it, I alerted Hub and Aberdeen City Council. The warnings were loud and clear but were ignored and this, sadly, is the inevitable consequence of that. Can it be rectified? Perhaps, but only if there is an urgency and a willingness to communicate and to engage honestly. I have to say though that there is an uncertainty about whether this building can be fully remediated at this late stage.
Your letter is a repetition of the letter you sent to me on 25th January 2019 (attached) and the contents, including references to visual inspection reports, are meaningless in the context of where we are now. What is required is a proper independent design review which is made available to all interested parties and that, to put it bluntly, is a requirement of the Health and Safety at Work Act. If there is an accident at the school then it becomes a Police matter and what you were asked to do against what you actually did in 2018, 2019 etc, matters a great deal.
Charlie Penman of Aberdeen City Council, along with Hub, carried out such a design review in June 2018 with Arup and BuroHappold, who are two of the largest and most reputable engineering consultants in the world. WSP, Cundall and your own geotechnical expert Mark Stewart also contributed. With respect, it is their opinions that will settle this, not your opinion. Can I ask why you are continually refusing to issue this information?
In order to improve communication, and save all of us some time, I copy this to BuroHappold and Fairhurst. Do they believe that this building is compliant and therefore safe?
This Email requires a point for point response and only a geotechnical expert can do that. Please, between yourself and Mr Swinney, I would ask you to communicate and to instruct this now. Neither of you can wait for a structural failure to occur and you only have to understand what is happening at the Grenfell Inquiry to realize that.
Dear Ms Laing and Mr Swinney,
ReplyDeletePermit me to add the following which was explained to me a short time ago by a geotechnical engineer. This information should be passed-on to your Building Standards officers: There are three possible modes of hydraulic failure - heave, internal erosion and piping.
1. 'Upwelling water' is an example of heave and that is identified in the Soil Investigation Report. This is groundwater and not surface water run-off.
2. Photograph 1 below shows internal erosion and piping. The sand and silt deposited around the flooded area indicate that this is ground water and not surface water run-off.
3. Piping is where artesian water is being blocked and and is rising to the surface. This, again, is groundwater and not surface water run-off.
That's three out of a possible three failure modes and that is as serious as it gets. It appears to me that you still believe that this is a surface water problem and it is not. This site will occasionally flood even when it is not raining. The ground water conditions have been re-set and, as I have explained before, that is causing groundwater to rise to the surface and overwhelm the site. This will, if it is not corrected quickly, cause the failure of the building.
This is all explained by expert members of the American Society of Civil Engineers and I attach another copy of their opinions for your information. Perhaps Aberdeen City Council should do what Edinburgh City Council did at the start of the Cole Inquiry and that is sit down and review this professionally with your engineers and take advice from them? That took Edinburgh City Council one-day to organize and they were commended for that by Professor Cole; how long will it take Aberdeen City Council?
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteI received comments yesterday afternoon from members of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) in response to Jenny Laing's Email which she issued on Wednesday. Let me set them out for you as they demonstrate just how far this Council are straying from the rules of engineering and law:
1. She states again that no new information has been presented. The opinions of ASCE members were presented to her in 2017 and we are currently waiting on the Council presenting their information to us. We have been waiting on that since 2018, haven't we? Items 4, 5 and 6 below explain why withholding this information is unlawful.
2. She states that the 'ponding issue' does not affect the building and so there is no need for the building design to be reviewed. That is the opposite to the requirements of the Design Standards and the requirements of law. This should have been done in 2016. How many times do I have to repeat this? Remember - you investigate the first 'limit state failure' so that the second, more serious, 'limit state failure' doesn't follow immediately behind?
3. Does this Council employ any engineering experts? Mark Stewart is an expert but I believe that he has now left the Council. Their officers appear to continually visit the site without ever seeing anything wrong. Every member of the ASCE has seen the problem and each one noticed it instantly.
4. She says that the Council has installed additional shallow drains and they haven't worked and so she has installed more, they haven't worked either and so she has plans to install yet more. I am confused by this. A drainage design was proposed and reviewed by members of the ASCE in 2017. Only one drain may be required, but it should be 5m deep. Is that accepted? Surely that was the whole point of the ASCE's involvement?
5. A hydraulic failure happened a short time ago at Surfside in Florida when an apartment block collapsed suddenly and without warning. You may remember it. A photograph of the site, post demolition, is attached and what you can see inside the building footprint is 'water inundation'. That appears to have caused 'soil collapse' to occur around the foundations and that has caused 'subsidence'. Exactly the same problem exists at Brimmond and I have been warning about it since 2014, since before construction began.
6. 2No hydraulic failures can be identified at Surfside, 3No hydraulic failures can be identified at Brimmond and that is indeed worrying. The ground surrounding Surfside was settling at a rate of 2-3mm per year and we know that the ground surrounding Brimmond is settling at a rate far greater than that. The foundations at Surfside failed first and that allowed a large part of the building to pancake downwards, from the top.
ReplyDelete7. Surfside was affected by tidal water; Brimmond is affected by artesian water which is potentially much more damaging.
8. The impression that Jenny Laing's letter gives is that she is leader of the council and that we are fortunate to have her attention for a brief period of time. John Swinney is exactly the same, isn't he? That's not the way engineering works. In the US, it is only experts from the NIST (National Institute of Science and Technology) who are permitted to speak on the subject of building failures simply because they are the only people deemed qualified, honest and competent to do so. No councilor or parliamentarian would behave in the way that Ms Laing and Mr Swinney are behaving here.
Looking forward, I have already made the point that the safety of the school is for the Teaching Unions to take forward from here. They have the information and it is now up to them. I believe that the Union UNISON ensured that Edinburgh Sick Kids Hospital was rectified some time ago and so it has been done before?
My situation is the responsibility of Jonathan Moore, who is an employee of the Scottish Government and Bruce Caldow of Harper MacLeod. All that I am concerned about now is seeing my situation resolved. Please contact me when they have what you consider an acceptable solution? That is all that I am asking you to do, Jackie. John Swinney's response is in process and I will send that to BuroHappold and Fairhurst when it arrives but please leave everything else to the Teaching Unions.
If you bump into Liz Smith at Holyrood she will be able to tell you that Scotland's previous Head of Building Standards, Bill Dodds and the CEO of Scottish Futures Trust, Peter Reekie, told a gathering of MSP's at the Holyrood Education and Skills Committee who were seeking reassurance on the safety of this school that: 'The safety of public buildings is in our DNA and this building is safe'. For dishonesty, that is priceless isn't it?
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteThe ASCE have carried-out a remarkable job for us and so I think we should all be prepared to hear them out. I am therefore passing-on comments received from their engineers yesterday and overnight. The first 8No opinions were delivered to you on Friday. Opinions 12 and 13, highlighted in blue, are my own opinions and not those of any ASCE member:
9. They have reviewed the attached letters from the Scottish Government, Aberdeen City Council and Hub. All of these letters require evidence and no evidence has been presented.
10. The design reviews by BuroHappold and Fairhurst which John Swinney describes and those by BuroHappold, Arup, Cundall, WSP and Mark Stewart of Aberdeen City Council, which were carried-out on behalf of Jenny Laing, must be provided. If they intend to continue to withhold this information, then an explanation is required as to why that is the case?
11. Hydraulic failures result in effects which are cumulative. In other words, the ground will be weaker at the end of year 3 than it was at the end of year 2, and so on. You may think the problem is settling-down but it is not, it is actually getting steadily worse. We saw that at Surfside in Florida where the foundations took more than 30-years to deteriorate to the point of collapse. During that time, minor repairs were being carried-out and the public thought that the problem was going-away. It wasn't.
12. When a 'limit state failure' is ignored, then a crime is being committed. This was explained to Scotland's present Head of Building Standards, Stephen Garvin, on 23rd May 2019. The Teaching Unions may want to ask what he has done about that?
13. The Scottish Government has sought extensive legal advice from Harper MacLeod, Muckle, Brodies and from the Scottish Government's own in-house legal team. Has anyone asked what this legal advice recommended?
The ASCE are among the best experts in the world are we are all fortunate to be able to benefit from their advice in this way. Their responses are always delivered quickly and the way they are delivered and presented means that they are each able to consider the full range of responses delivered by their colleagues. There is no conclusion, you need to form your own conclusion, but the weight of opinion in this case is absolutely overwhelming. As I alluded to on Friday, this information is provided for use by the Teaching Unions and it is for them to pursue this now with their own advisors and it is for them to seek answers from the Scottish Government, Aberdeen City Council and Hub.
We are only waiting on a letter by John Swinney and I expect that letter to propose a solution which addresses the situation that I have been left in for the past 7-years. Bob may be able to offer confidential advice on that?
It is worrying that this case has had to be solved by a member of the public, Bob Matheson and the ASCE, isn't it? Neither of us are being paid for this. I do not know what Bob's opinions are, but I can tell you that many in the ASCE are shocked and angered by what they are seeing here.
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteUndernoted is one of the key Emails.
When sandy/silty water is coming out of the ground, the first two limit states have been exceeded. When the ground starts collapsing, the third limit state has been exceeded. You can see all three in this photograph.
You don't get any further warnings because the forth limit state is 'deformation of the structure' and the fifth is 'collapse' and not even the experts are predicting when that will happen.
Harper MacLeod didn't pass this on to anyone. Hence, we are still here six-years later and the ASCE are having to sort this out for us in their spare time.
To: Bruce Caldow, Harper MacLeod
Date: 22nd November 2015
Bruce,
I was in Aberdeen last week and took this photograph of the Brimmond playground on Thursday 19th November. I believe that the source of this water, and the reason that it is that is apparently trapped in this location, should be investigated.
You will recall that I believe that there is a problem with the design of this school. Specifically, that the design will allow water inundation, soil collapse and subsidence to occur. I may of course be wrong, but my assertion is supported by the Design Standards and the Soil Investigation Report.
I am sending this Email to you so that you can kindly pass it on to the appropriate recipients.
Dear Ms Laing,
ReplyDeleteFurther to your Email of 4th November, trailing. I took further advice from expert members of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), from the 4th November - 8th November, and received the 13No comments undernoted. This is in addition to the 45No comments from some of the same experts (attached) that you already have in your possession.
It does indeed appear that there is a major problem with the safety of this building.
We have established that Aberdeen City Council do not employ any geotechnical experts. In that case, Stephen Garvin is the only person who can adjudicate and it is his job, as Scotland's Head of Building Standards, to do that.
Kindly let us know when his decision will be ready? I'm sure that I do not have to stress the importance of this, either to yourself or to Mr Garvin.
ReplyDeleteDear Ms Laing,
This sequence of Emails has been on-going for approximately 6-weeks and appears to be going nowhere. I have therefore decided to give it another few days and then engage with the press in order to achieve a resolution.
What we have here is the obvious cover-up of an unsafe building.
The others can contribute at this point as I have never understood why it is seen as my role to single-handedly resolve this.
Permit me to summarize a key requirement of the Health and Safety at Work Act for you: Once a complaint is made, the Employer (the Council) must undertake an independent investigation urgently and make the results available to the Employees (the Teachers). That's what you do when you take the Health and Safety at Work Act seriously. You haven't done that, have you?
Dear Ms Laing,
ReplyDeleteThe term 'Top Urgent' is used to describe safety concerns which should be addressed quickly. This term started to be used subsequent to the Piper Alpha Inquiry and has since been adopted worldwide. The normal convention is to provide an answer within 24-hours - you have now had 7-weeks and you have failed to respond.
It is possible that this story will now appear in the press and so let me set-out, once again, the concerns that I and many others have expressed over this building:
The Design Standard, with which this building is legally bound to comply, sets out 5No 'limit states' of failure. These are the precursors to a collapse of the building and they are as follows:
1. Water rising out of the ground.
2. Sand and silt rising out of the ground.
3. Deformation of the ground.
4. Deformation of the building.
5. Collapse of the building.
We are currently at 3, waiting for 4 to happen and the attached photograph shows this. Often, 4 and 5 happen at the same time and so we are in an incredibly serious situation, aren't we.
Each time a limit state is reached, an investigation by an expert is required. We therefore have three investigations by experts and John Swinney MSP describes them in his letter to Jackie Baillie MSP of 20th December 2017 (attached). The impression he gives is that these reports say that the school is safe. The only way we will all know whether that is, or is not, the case is to make these reports available to us and that has not been done.
If the reports say something different, then that is a potentially criminal law situation under the Health and Safety at Work Act. Not only that, but the public perception of being continually misled in terms of the safety of a public building will be entirely negative.
Under the circumstances prevailing at the moment, it would be prudent to issue these reports before close of business today.
Dear Ms Laing,
ReplyDeleteLet me refer you to 3.8.8, which is on page 21 of the 2017 Cole Inquiry Report into the safety of Scotland's schools:
"It is also clear that clients, particularly public sector clients with statutory duties in relation to the communities they serve, cannot delegate away from themselves the responsibility of putting in place an appropriate level of informed, independent scrutiny to ensure the safety of the buildings they procure. By independent scrutiny the Inquiry is referring to inspection by individuals or organizations appointed by or directly employed by the client and who are independent of the project company or contractor undertaking the project."
This is self-explanatory, isn't it? I presume that Aberdeen City Council, the Scottish Government and the Teaching Unions have all accepted these recommendations?
Because you wouldn't carry-out independent checks, I have had to carry them out for you and you continue to set them aside and parrot the opinion of Hub and the Contractor. I've endured more than four years of this now; do you have any idea how frustrating that is?
A mistake was clearly made during construction of this school. Surely everyone accepts that by now? It is time that you moved away from defending the Contractor all the time and started representing the public interest by getting this school rectified?
Your Council's continuing reliance on visual inspection reports, carried-out by yourselves, Hub and the Contractor, is dealt with in 3.8.4 of the Cole Inquiry Report:
"What is also significant is that highly professional and competent teams of structural engineers were unable to identify through visual inspections, the existence of serious defects in construction. This point is worthy of wider consideration by those who may have relied on visual inspections as a form of assurance that the construction is sound. There is no easy practical way of doing this and it requires effective quality assurance and scrutiny during construction."
Aberdeen City Council must be the only Council in Scotland who is still relying on visual inspections and that is what has brought us all to this tragic outcome. Not only are you still relying on them, but you are delegating to the Contractor and Hub the duty of carrying them out and you are just agreeing with what they say. What the Cole Inquiry explains is that, in doing that, you are failing to discharge your statutory duties. This couldn't be any clearer, could it? How many times have I had to tell you this over the years?
The first step in remedying this situation is to issue the design checks which I asked to be delivered on Friday. Please advise when this will be done? Presumably they will be issued to Jackie Baillie?
Dear Mr Jack,
ReplyDeleteBrendan O'Hara is my constituency MP and he has kindly offered to help. I sent a small amount of information to him yesterday and today which I consider is enough to explain the situation. I suggested he call Bob Matheson of Public Concern at Work, who is an undoubted expert who knows and understands the history of this case very clearly.
The Sunday Mail story included the statement: 'this school could collapse at any time', which sounds like an exaggeration, but is it an exaggeration? The second of the attached letters, from Jackie Baillie to Jenny Laing, explains where that statement comes from and provides the measured, supporting evidence for it. It's therefore not an exaggeration, is it?
The situation that the story has left us in is that Aberdeen City Council should supply evidence in the form of design checks by Ramsay and Chalmers, Fairhurst and BuroHappold which prove that the school is safe. I asked for them to be provided last Friday and we have had no response from the Council and so something is causing a hold-up. Can you find-out what the problem is?
The Sunday Mail explained that I have been blacklisted and prevented from working in the UK since 2014. Responsibility for that situation lies with Ogilvie Construction, Harper MacLeod and Aberdeen City Council. If I am wrong then blacklisting is perhaps something that I should have thought about at the time and something I would have to learn to live with now. But if I am right, and it does seem likely that I am right, then surely Ogilvie Construction and Harper MacLeod should be blacklisted and Aberdeen City Council should face serious sanction? Why should we keep on employing and paying these people?
I have asked Brendan to help me resolve this as I need to get back to work and I'm sure that all of you understand that.
Finally, it is for the building owner to prove that his building is safe, it is not for a member of the public to prove that it is unsafe. Would you all agree with that? We have not complied with that here and that is why this has taken over 7-years to get this far.
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteLet me add the following clarification because, from my experience, letters from the Scottish Government are usually a waste of everyone's time.
It is the undernoted minutes, from the August 2016 meeting, that John Swinney has been asked to clarify with design reports from Ramsay and Chalmers, Fairhurst and BuroHappold.
MEETING 1. 17th August 2016
In Attendance: Stephen Dick, Gary McAteer, Jonathan Moore (Scottish Government), Bill Dodds (Scottish Government)
1) BD stated that the foundations were designed on a presumed available bearing capacity of 150kN/m2. SD stated that the Fairhurst SI recommends: 'The presence of shallow and potentially upwelling groundwater on the site reduces the available bearing capacity to <75kN/m2.
2) SD stated that the Fairhurst SI report contains a number of recommendations regarding control of water table levels. SD referred to an Email from Fairhurst which stated that standard foundations would not be suitable, and another which stated that if a permanent land drainage system could not be installed then a piled foundation would be necessary.
9) SD stated that the photographs of flooding tended to show water which had a silt content indicating that the flooding had been caused by ground-water and not surface water. JM stated that the colour could be explained by silt washing off the topsoil.
14) A BuroHappold drawing was examined showing a 60mm drop in level between the low point of the kerb and the south corner. The photograph from March 2016 was examined and SD stated that the drop in level now looked to be in excess of 300mm. SD stated that approximately 25m3 of soil had been lost due to either soil collapse or scour last winter.
17) GMcA suggested Professor Albert Rodger from Aberdeen University would be able to provide an independent and expert opinion. JM stated that Ramsay and Chalmers of Aberdeen had already provided an independent opinion and found no sign of subsidence either within the school buildings or within the playgrounds.
18) There is no sign of flooding at the moment. G.McA asked if it was likely to rise again in the winter and asked if everyone at the meeting was prepared to wait for that.
It appears to me that we are in this situation because one City Council in Scotland, Aberdeen City Council, has ignored the recommendations of the Cole Inquiry. I should not be paying for that and, I'm sure you will agree, the public should not be paying for it either.
Should it really take five and a half years to sort this out? This building has standard foundations which, on the basis of the evidence I have presented, are unsuitable. It's a very unusual situation and I am not aware of any other examples of it worldwide. So, we await the Scottish Government's response.
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteAre we in another stasis where everyone says they are too busy to respond?
Under the Health and Safety at Work Act, John Swinney has 24-hours to respond and I presume he hasn't done that?
I have read the BuroHappold design review report and it profoundly affects the life safety of those who use this building every day. It was discussed at the Scottish Government meeting of 17th August 2016 referred to below. Gary McAteer is a senior criminal lawyer and he attended that meeting and so I include him in the circulation and he can provide any clarification you need. You have spoken to him before haven't you?
I haven't read the reports by Ramsay and Chalmers or Fairhurst, but can we just apply the law please and have all three of them delivered to you today?
Dear Brendan,
ReplyDeleteI was advised of a possible solution last night by the engineer who assisted me in putting together the comments from the American Society of Civil Engineers in 2017 and again recently. Up until now, it has been easier for everyone to do nothing, but a newspaper story can change that. Let me explain:
The key pieces of information are attached:
1. Shirley Ann Somerville's letter of 29th June 2021
2. John Swinney's letter of 20th December 2017
3. ASCE comments and opinions of 17th November 2017
Items 1 and 3 are what they are and Shirley Ann Somerville is now agreeing with the ASCE, isn't she? "Additional drainage is required...they've tried this before...it hasn't worked and so they are going to try again. In the meantime, they will continue to monitor the building." That is what the ASCE recommended we do in 2017.
Item 2 is the problem and John Swinney has been asked to substantiate this with the actual reports from the three engineering firms he names in the letter, Ramsay and Chalmers, Fairhurst and BuroHappold. He agreed to provide this 6-weeks ago but hasn't done it yet. So, letter 2 is the roadblock and a solution needs to be found.
If we go back to the beginning; I was terminated from my job by the Contractor for complaining that the design had been changed and that the new design wouldn't work. After my termination, I gave it a month to see whether the Contractor would fix the problem, he didn't, and so I reported it as a whistleblower to Harper MacLeod and to Aberdeen City Council. At that point, they had sufficient time to investigate but they didn't do that. I only contacted the Scottish Government much later, after the building was finished and subsidence had started and it was to say: "I told you this was going to happen." By that time it was too late and the Scottish Government has been firefighting ever since.
The engineer asks: "Why are you not blaming the Contractor, Harper MacLeod and management consultant Faithfull and Gould for this? They knew about it at the time, the Scottish Government didn't. They each carry 'professional indemnity insurance' which insures against honest mistakes made by professionals and there would be a public expectation that the cost of this would be met by the private sector and their insurers, rather than the public sector?"
That leaves me vindicated and ready to move-on. "Why didn't Harper MacLeod and Faithfull and Gould listen to the whistleblower?" This scenario would leave me on the same side as the Scottish Government and that is the only way this will work from here.
John Swinney's letter is answered by him saying that he has consulted with his engineering advisors and can confirm that a mistake was made during construction. That will be corrected during next summer's school shut-down. In the meantime, the school will be monitored to ensure its safety. That brings John Swinney into line with Shirley Ann Somerville and with the ASCE.
That effectively brings the matter to an end with the Scottish Government coming down on the side of the whistleblower. There is no perfect solution to this but this is the most sensible solution that I am aware of and so please have a think about it in the days ahead. Bob Matheson is back at work on Monday and he will think about it too. I don't know what you think about this, but my view is that he is the trusted expert and we should be guided by him wherever possible? It's a solution that we need now as this cannot go-on indefinitely.
Finally, I wouldn't underestimate the financial cost of this remedial work. The cost will not be trivial and the Contractor is no doubt aware of that. On the other hand, the cost of doing nothing will be in the order of £20million and possibly a lot more than that.
We'll get a conclusion soon.
ReplyDelete3No Emails from Jenny Laing tonight and 1No from Jackie Baillie. I think this may be presented as a Labour Party fuck-up. I've thought that for the past few months now. However, a newspaper story makes all the difference and this is proof of that.
ReplyDeleteSent earlier in the week George...I think the problem has been that any whistleblower is seen by Holyrood as an enemy of the SG, which of course we are not.
ReplyDeleteGeorge is ACC's Head of Building Standards. I have never met the chap but I do not expect him to disagree with me simply because no-one else has.
I am copying-in Ian Murray, Oliver Mundell and Brendan O'Hara these days and so we have some pressure.
I'll keep in touch with you over the coming days via this website. Publish what you like, I'll leave that to you.
So, the Sunday Mail did an excellent job.
Dear Gordon,
I sent the undernoted 4No attachments to Jenny Laing and Jackie Baillie earlier this evening and I thought it best to copy it directly to you so that you have it straight away in the morning.
The action at the moment is to have Jackie Baillie's letter of 2nd August 2018 answered and I'm afraid to say that you have been allocated the job of doing that. Jenny Laing will answer the first 4 paragraphs and the final paragraph but the point for point response should be by you.
The Fairhurst Soil Investigation Report is attached and what it shows is that Brimmond is an unusual site containing bands of light expansive clay soils and bands of sands and gravels. Artesian conditions and upwelling water are identified in the Report. A mistake was made during construction of the school whereby a long, 5m deep trench was dug looking for contaminated soils and the trench was backfilled again with clay which meant that the gravel filled artesian layers became blocked. It's akin to cutting through a series of underground water mains and expecting nothing to happen.
In the summer months, this does not appear to present a significant problem but in the winter months it presents an incredibly serious problem. Water inundation from the blocked artesian layers is appearing at the surface, causing scour and softening of the light clay soils and subsidence is occurring. It is only a matter of time before this affects the building and that will result in a structural failure and loss of the entire value of the building.
Just about the only way that a building, which is built upon shallow pad foundations, will work on a site like this is to drain the site and keep all excavations shallow. By accident, the Contractor has managed to do the opposite and that is manifesting in problems of flooding, soil collapse and subsidence which will continue until a structural collapse occurs.
The specific problem is that the soil immediately under the foundation, the pressure bulb, is at risk of softening and scour. That could already be happening and we just haven't noticed it yet. Specifically, the required available bearing capacity in these pressure bulbs is 150kN/m2 and, when inundated with water, this drops to <75kN/m2 and so you can instantly see the problem.
It has been reviewed by expert members of the American Society of Civil Engineers and their comments and opinions are attached. All of them recognize the same problem that I am reporting to you; some of them say it can be fixed, but not all of them say that and a few of them are fairly pessimistic it has to be said.
My opinion is that this was a mistake made by the contractor and that he should be brought back to fix it. It has been passed as safe for the past 5-years on the basis of the Ramsay and Chalmers visual inspection report attached and I can only say that I find that astonishing. Why are we still relying on these things?
If you want to speak to me about any of this then just Email me back and I'll give you my phone number.
As you can imagine, I am keen to see this resolved as soon as possible and I think that goes for everyone now.
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteAt the stage we are at now, I would rather keep this as simple as possible and that way we will get it finished quickly and that is what everyone wants. Gordon Spence is the Head of Building Standards and Jenny Laing is the Council Leader and these are the only people that I would expect to contribute to this?
Earlier (at 18.49 and 19.23), I sent Jenny Laing a copy of your letter of 2nd August 2018 along with 3No attachments. If Jenny Laing hands this information over to Mr Spence in the morning and they both, between them, provide a proper and full response to your letter then we can all draw a line under this. Your letter is not complex and it just needs to be answered.
My opinion is that a mistake was made during construction of this school. At the time, the mistake was covered-up by the Contractor, Harper MacLeod and Faithful and Gould and it is only now that the owner is realizing that something isn't right with this building?
Mr Spence may agree with myself and the others and, if that is the case, then Aberdeen City Council can move quickly to discuss and agree who is going to design the remedial works, who is going to carry them out, when and who is going to pay for and have liability for them.
That's the way I see it from here, Jackie. I'll sent the information directly to Mr Spence just now so that he has it first thing in the morning. If he wants to contact me either by Email or phone then I will be happy to speak to him.
Co-Leader
ReplyDeleteAberdeen City Council
Town House
Broad Street
Aberdeeen AB10 1FY
Our Ref: JB1520902
August 2018
Dear Jenny,
Brimmond School
I write in response to your letter of 19th July 2018 regarding the safety of Brimmond School in Aberdeen.
As you know, the construction of Brimmond School has been questioned by one of my constituents who claims that the design was changed to incorporate a deep contamination excavation which ran the full width of the site from north to south. The effect of this was to re-set the pattern of ground-water flowing through the site and he claims that this will cause ‘soil collapse’ and ‘subsidence’ to occur.
These effects can happen slowly, or very quickly and so, if my constituent is correct, it follows that a risk of partial collapse may have been inadvertently built-in to this building and it should be investigated and remedied quickly.
During the course of the past 2-years I am aware that my constituent has presented a range of evidence in support of his concerns, but on each occasion he has been told: ‘We’ve had the school checked by a qualified engineer there is no subsidence’. My constituent has nevertheless continued with his investigations and in September 2017 he consulted expert members of the American Society of Civil Engineers, the clear majority of whom agreed with my constituent’s hypothesis. Still nothing has changed and, by virtue of your letter, my constituent has been told again ‘We’ve had the school checked by a qualified engineer there is no subsidence’.It does seem that no matter how strong his evidence may be, he will always receive the same reply, whether from the local authority or indeed the Scottish Government.
It would therefore seem sensible at this point to take a step back and investigate the strength of the survey, which is a visual survey, by Peter Fraser of Ramsay and Chalmers Consulting Structural Engineers to establish if it would provide robust evidence to protect the owner of the building against claims of negligence, should an accident occur at the school due to defects identified by my constituent, and not acted upon by Aberdeen City Council:
1. The Cole Enquiry 2017
The last failure of a school building took place in 2016 at Oxgangs Primary School in Edinburgh. That led to an investigation into the safety of all recently built schools in that city. 17 of these schools were forced to close until repairs were carried-out as they were considered to be ‘unsafe’. It was found that, upon initial completion and hand-over to
Edinburgh City Council, all of these schools were given similar visual surveys by structural engineers saying that the buildings appeared to be correct and that there was nothing of any concern. Professor Cole’s response to that was to recommend that owners should discontinue using these visual surveys. So, since the Cole Enquiry of February 2017, all building owners, and especially school building owners, should no longer be relying upon visual surveys of the type issued by Ramsay and Chalmers to prove the adequacy of design and construction.
2. The SER Certification Scheme
This is the building control design review system, managed by the Institution of Structural Engineers, which now operates in Scotland. A 2-storey school building on a brownfield site would require to be design checked by an independent engineering team. Any amendment to that design would require another design check by an independent engineering team. Has this been done?SER do not recognize visual surveys, even for the simplest private buildings. Why, therefore, is this survey being presented as proof of the adequacy of the design and construction on a large public building?
3. Eurocode 7
ReplyDeleteThe ‘ultimate limit state’ ‘GEO’, which is ‘excessive deformation of the ground’ was reached soon after the building was opened. This requires an immediate investigation by a geotechnical specialist in order to determine the cause of the failure and to determine what measures have to be put in place to prevent further deterioration. Has this been done?A Principal ‘P’ requirement of Eurocode 7 is that no standing groundwater is visible around the apron of a building as it can lead to a rapid degradation of the building’s foundations. Standing groundwater is visible around the apron of this building during each winter and the building will not stand up to this indefinitely. What is the Council’s response to this?
4. Fairhurst’s Soil Investigation Report 83263
This states in the Executive Summary that: ‘The presence of shallow and potentially upwelling groundwater on the site reduces the allowable bearing capacity to <75kN/m-2 and, with this present, they will not be appropriate as a founding strata’. Photographs of the site in winter show that we do have shallow and upwelling water present. Thus, the actual available strength of the soil is less than 50% of that required to safely support the weight of the building. What do the Council propose to do to remedy this?
5. Ramsay and Chalmers Visual Report/Aberdeen School Project Discussion and Comments (14)
We can compare the Ramsay and Chalmers visual report issued in September 2016, with Aberdeen School Project Discussion and Comments (14) issued in October 2017. I note that Peter Fraser is not a geotechnical specialist, the 37 members of the ASCE are geotechnical specialists; Peter Fraser cannot see any subsidence, the members of the
ASCE can see subsidence and many of them are not optimistic about the future prospects for this building. Is there not a very clear conflict of opinion here which should be investigated by the Council?
In conclusion, I would suggest to you that the Ramsay and Chalmers visual report is at odds with the views expressed by many others who are specialists in the field; it fails to comply with the requirements of the SER Certification Scheme and the Council’s reliance on such a report fails to acknowledge the recommendations of the Cole EnquiryReport. Further, the failure to comply with the design recommendations provided in Fairhurst’s Soil Investigation Report and to investigate an apparent ultimate limit state failure as described in Eurocode 7 raise concerns about the future safety of the building.
For peace of mind and for the safety of this and future generations of school children, I would be grateful if you would consider initiating an independent investigation of the site. Yours sincerely,
Jackie Baillie MSP
Dumbarton Constituency
OK Jackie and thanks. It sounds as though we are nearly at the end now.
ReplyDeleteI received a message from Gordon Spence a short time ago confirming that his response will be ready in 5-days and that is good news.
My point regarding Holyrood is that there is an accepted response time for correspondence, which world governments adhere to, and it is 24-hours for matters which concern life safety. That should apply all at Holyrood too?
Ironically, this was established and accepted worldwide after the Piper Alpha Inquiry and it has been revisited more recently at the Grenfell Inquiry. I think I mentioned this previously to Jenny Laing?
George - The ACC report will be issued on Thursday or Friday of next week. I think I may have said that already. But, that will be the end of it.
ReplyDeleteI intend to shut-up now and wait for that to arrive. When it does arrive, I will send it to you and Norman.
So, please leave things as they are for the next week. Jackie's letter is the last letter to be posted for now.
I was advised that when dealing with the press: 'say that this building will collapse and it could happen any time'. 'Leave it for them to prove you wrong'.
So, that's what I have done.
Although I wouldn't trust Jackie Baillie as far as I could throw her, I have suggested that they blame Ogilvie, Harper MacLeod and Faithful and Gould for this. That provides a quick solution, which suits us best.
I understand that is now underway and that especially Ogilvie and Harper MacLeod are coming under increasing pressure now.
Keep Jackie's letter posted in the meantime George as it is enormously helpful.
I will contact you if anything happens in the meantime, but it might not and so it will be next Thursday/Friday by which time we should be nearly finished.
The situation has changed entirely now and Jackie's bullshit is no longer being accepted.
Dear Mr Dick,
ReplyDeleteThank you for the information regarding Brimmond School. I am replying in my role as Building Standards Manager, a role which encompasses two elements under the Building (Scot) Act 2003:
Verifier – approval of building warrants and completion submissions
Enforcement Authority – administration of the enforcement elements of that Act
It is important to clarify that in carrying out either of the above roles, Building Standards act independently and impartially from other Council services. The administration of the Act is applied consistently whether the building in question is privately owned or owned by the Local Authority.
The verification role for Brimmond School is complete. A building warrant approval was granted, the structural aspects were certified via an SER certificate and subsequently, an Acceptance of Completion Submission was issued. Should further warrantable work be required to the building, then this work will be subject to the same building warrant process.
In terms of enforcement, Building Standards will only pursue enforcement if it is in the public interest. I will now request further information from the building owner to establish if any defects are apparent and what actions, if any, the Council have taken to investigate. A decision will then be made on public interest grounds whether to pursue further.
As you can see from the above, responding to the points raised in Jackie Ballie’s letter, sits with the building owner and not with the Building Standards service. Our role does not include passing opinion on potential defects. It is the building owner’s responsibility to investigate and resolve any defects that may be uncovered.
Regards,
Gordon
Dear Gordon,
ReplyDeleteCan we all assume that you have had the building design checked by your geotechnical engineering consultant, Fairhurst and it has been found to be unsafe?
We have been advised by many expert engineers worldwide that what we have here is an unsafe building caused by non-compliance with Design Standards and that, as I understand it, puts us within the realms of criminal law and therefore within the realms of public interest.
Any report of an unsafe building should be investigated immediately by Building Standards? Equally, any non compliance with Design Standards can only be investigated and explained by Building Standards? I understand that these are statutory duties which are placed upon you.
If we go back to the Cole Inquiry into the safety of Scotland's schools; the decision to close schools was taken by councillors, and it was taken within hours, but they were responding to advice and recommendations provided to them by Edinburgh City Council Building Standards officials. That protocol was reviewed and commended at the time by Professor Cole. You, on the other hand, appear to be suggesting that this is not your role?
Whether the Building Standards certification and sign-off procedure is complete or not is frankly irrelevant. It was complete in Edinburgh too but as soon as Building Standards were aware that mistakes had been made, they acted. That, again, is the statutory responsibility which you owe to those who use this building every day.
The situation we have is that Jackie Baillie's letter (attached) of 2nd August 2018 was not answered by the building owner, represented by Jenny Laing. She advised me to contact you as it is your function to answer this and so kindly do so and distribute it to those listed above before close of business today.
Jackie - We still appear to be waiting on the Scottish Government's evidence in support of their letter of 20th December 2017 (attached)? Can we presume, at this stage, that this evidence does not exist? Can you advise what steps we take now as 8-weeks have now elapsed and this information is clearly not going to be provided?
Please respond today.
Thank you,
S. Dick
Can you post these two letters up please George?
ReplyDeleteCan you post this for me, George?
ReplyDeleteDear Ms Somerville, Mr Cooper and Ms Baillie,
I address this to all of you as there are actions for all of you just now.
I refer to the newspaper story in the Sunday Mail of 21st November 2021 which advised that Brimmond School could collapse at any time. I have explained to Aberdeen City Council that we are now close to a structural collapse. Specifically, we have reached failure level 3, failure level 4 is deformation of the structure and that is often followed, almost instantly, by failure level 5 which is collapse of the structure.
We are at the stage now when I have to be proven either right, or wrong and I think we can all agree upon that? There is no middle ground, I'm afraid.
The engineering case was explained to the Scottish Government's Jonathan Moore in 2016 and it remains unchanged. It has since been peer reviewed by almost forty world experts and that peer review has been presented to the Scottish Government's Stephen Garvin and Aberdeen City Council's Jenny Laing, without comment. What it confirmed was that this building is lying upon a bed of soil which is being weakened, cumulatively, by pressurised, turbulent water flowing through it. The same process is thought to have brought down the Surfside apartment building in Miami in early summer and to have brought down many buildings in Germany a few months later. More and more of these building failures are expected in the years ahead due to changing weather patterns.
There is a difference though; these buildings had been standing for many years and were not expected to fail. Brimmond School has been standing for 5-years and is expected to fail. The Sunday Mail has told us that and they have read the peer reviews. If you have not read them, then I would do so now.
I have spent the past 4-weeks corresponding with Aberdeen City Council as they are the building owners. As you can see below, I have reached another impasse with Mr Spence and I would expect Aberdeen City Council to refuse to communicate from now on. I say that because that is what they have done in previous years.
The basis of Mr Spence's argument is that he is Head of Building Standards in Aberdeen and so the decision is his alone. That is not the way it works of course and the statutory process he refers to below is, in fact, the Health and Safety at Work Act. There are no doubt many other statutory processes but the Health and Safety at Work Act stands ahead of them all by a considerable margin. In the situation we have here, the 'Employee' (the Teaching Unions) can ask the 'Employer' (the Council) for a design check by an independent geotechnical consultant and it must be provided by virtue of the provisions of the Act. Can Mr Cooper confirm to us that he has done that?
Can you post this up please George:
ReplyDeleteDear Mr Wilson,
Have Fairhurst and BuroHappold issued their responses yet?
I have made the analogy between Brimmond and Surfside in Florida a number of times now and the below video relating to Surfside explains how deformation of the ground inevitably leads to deformation and collapse of the structure. You will note that the subsidence recorded on the land outside the building was far less than that which was occurring under the building itself and that is my concern for Brimmond. Surfside had deep foundations and Brimmond has shallow foundations and the risks for Brimmond are greater as a consequence of that.
What Secrets will be Uncovered at Champlain Towers South Collapse Site? We look at its Foundation. - YouTube
It is now for the Teaching Unions to take this forward with all of the other parties that are involved. I have carried-out the investigative work so far. It has been issued to everyone and no-one has responded. It is now for the Teaching Unions to take advice and decide what to do next. Perhaps when questions 1-15 below are fully answered then some conclusions can be drawn? My concern at this point is achieving an outcome for myself and that is why Jackie Baillie, Brendan O'Hara and Bob Matheson are copied-in. They have seen this video before, but pass it on to Gordon Spence please because it explains the crucial role 'limit states' have in engineering nowadays.
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteApologies for contacting you on New Years Eve. I have just received a notice that another Scottish Government response will be issued to me. The only response that I am expecting is from John Swinney and I have been waiting for that since 2018. Let me explain:
1. The safety of the school is now a matter for the Teaching Unions and Aberdeen City Council. Both have been issued with my evidence and they are currently waiting for questions to be answered by Fairhurst and reviewed by BuroHappold and that will settle it once and for all.
2. My career needs to be put back on track and it is the responsibility of the Scottish Government to do that. I attach the letters below which justify my position; you have seen them many times now. They are untrue and they have virtually ended my career. Can you ensure than Mr. Swinney understands that this is all that is required of him?
I trust this is clear? I have copied everyone in so that they know the position too.
Dear Mr Wilson,
ReplyDeleteI expect the Fairhurst and BuroHappold responses will be ready for you now. You can request this information from them and hand it over to the EIS and it will be for them to decide what to do next. Please also distribute it to Jackie Baillie MSP, Brendan O'Hara MP and Bob Matheson, who are assisting me.
Dear Jackie and Brendan,
I have questioned the veracity of Jonathan Moore's letters of 30th September and 7th October 2016, and John Swinney's letter of 20th December 2017 many times and the responses you will get from the Council will confirm if these letters are truthful or not. For clarity, I attach them again below. You are both aware of the circumstances I have been living under as a result of these letters and so I would ask for your advice on the actions which are open to me now as my complaint is about the conduct of a Scottish Government Minister, his civil-servants, and the negative outcomes which have flowed from that?
I include Hannah Smith of the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE) as the ICE code of professional conduct should be met by all of its members just now. Question 4 below refers to a statement made by Fairhurst which is misleading and that is not the only example I found and so can the ICE ensure that its members provide their expert opinions with the honesty that one would expect?
Hopefully we will now see daily progress towards a solution. As I have said, my involvement is practically over and I should not be continuing to suffer the effects of long-term unemployment whilst those responsible for this foul-up continue to be paid and even, in some cases, promoted. I cannot express it any more clearly than that and I will go back to the press if I have to because that is the avenue that works.
Dear Anon
ReplyDeleteThe problem with politicians is that they aren't willing to give any issue a 100% of their time, if it fits in with their political agenda against their opponents then they may use a case as a 'weapon'.
George
Scottish Building Standards is an example of the type of public body in Scotland that worked pre-Holyrood, but doesn't work nowadays.
ReplyDeleteI had a meeting with this guy almost 3-years ago and I explained it all to him. He was so frightened, he was afraid to talk and all I remember him saying was that 'subsidence is very rare'. I agreed, but nevertheless spent 3-hours explaining it to him.
A Scottish Government guy was at the meeting too, Scott Johnston, they spent the whole 3-hours looking at each other.
If anything is seen as political then they will not touch it with a bargepole. I'm glad this guy has been sucked into the vortex too because he epitomises all that is wrong in public life in Scotland just now.
Stephen Garvin - Head of Building Standards - The …
https://uk.linkedin.com/in/stephen-garvin-67590b11
06/07/2018 · Stephen Garvin Head of Building Standards at The Scottish Government Livingston, Scotland, United Kingdom500+ connections Join to Connect The Scottish Government Heriot-Watt University Company...
Works For: The Scottish Government
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The Laird Report: Professor Robert Rennie, LL.B, PhD, FRSA ... glasgowunihumanrights.blogs…
Bob Gray - Senior Contracts Manager - Muir Construction ... uk.linkedin.com
Gordon Wilkinson - Director Cost Management - Pick Everard ... uk.linkedin.com
Bruce Caldow - Partner - Harper Macleod LLP | LinkedIn uk.linkedin.com
Rob Polkinghorne - Chief Operating Officer - Aberdeen City ... uk.linkedin.com
...and the corollary to the above is that all of our hospitals and schools which have been built over the past 10-15 years and which we all believe have been thoroughly checked and are safe, haven't been checked at-all.
ReplyDeleteIf you build an extension onto the side of your house then you will have to comply with Design Standards and all the rest of it. If you build a school, then you don't have to do that. Just look at it visually at the end and if it looks OK, then that's all that is required.
The Scottish Government will do anything other than get these buildings inspected by experts because, to do that, will condemn some of them to major re-building work - just look at Edinburgh Sick Kids Hospital for example.
That was brought about by the Union UNISON who insisted it was professionally checked before their members would occupy the building.
We have not had the assistance of any Union or any professional institution here and it has to be done by a member of the public, a blogger and the Sunday Mail. It makes you worry doesn't it.
It's about time all of them started doing their jobs and representing their members and the public interest.
Norman Silvester called 5-minutes ago. He's got all the information that Aberdeen City Council sent to me and he's got my comments.
ReplyDeleteHe's going to get this reviewed by an independent academic. I suggested he speak to Bob Matheson who should be able to put him on to someone. My own preference is for someone who is not Scottish and he agrees.
So, there will be nothing in the Sunday Mail tomorrow, but Norman is working on it.
My next door neighbour worked for the BBC. She said that once the press are on to it, they know how to pursue it best. Just leave everything to them. It is certainly not free of risk, but the risks for me are far lower than they are for the others.
Rona Cargill - HR Director - Harper Macleod LLP | LinkedIn
ReplyDeletehttps://uk.linkedin.com/in/rona-cargill-5261a61a
Rona Cargill - HR Director - Harper Macleod LLP | LinkedIn View Rona Cargill’s profile on LinkedIn, the world’s largest professional community. Rona has 4 jobs listed on their profile. See the...
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Gordon Wilkinson - Director Cost Management - Pick Everard ... uk.linkedin.com
Gary McAteer - Director - Beltrami & Company Ltd ... uk.linkedin.com
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Dear Cheryl,
ReplyDeleteI spoke earlier to the journalist who is covering this story. More than 2-months have elapsed since the original story and more than 1-month since Aberdeen City Council released their information (included below), so it is now time to move the story on.
Both Holyrood and Aberdeen City Council are working at their own speed. Their previous letters set-out their positions and my experience has been that this is unlikely to change and so I'd rather not give them any longer.
The complete information should now be reviewed by an independent expert. In order to provide urgency and impartiality, this should perhaps be led by the EIS. In Scotland, this has been done before, for example by UNISON at Edinburgh Sick Kids Hospital and so it is nothing new. For clarity, I am not asking the EIS to carry-out any checks, just to hand the limited information attached to this Email to an independent expert and ask for his/her opinion.
So, the action is with the EIS to take this forward from here?
Dear Hannah,
The ICE's finding that 'visual inspection reports' are acceptable is seen as vindication of this method of providing design review and construction supervision. I remember Bob had reservations about this at the time; I have reservations about it too and I can tell you that Scottish lawyers have already noticed it. In light of the Cole Inquiry recommendations, this doesn't seem either helpful or in-line with what the other professional institutions are recommending.
I would ask the ICE to review the attached visual inspection reports by Fairhurst from 2020 and Cundall from 2016. Holyrood and Aberdeen City Council say that this as all the proof they need that the building is safe. Is the ICE saying that too because, as things stand at the moment, that is the position you have taken?
My view is that the 'visual inspection reports' by all, and certainly by Fairhurst, are lacking in honesty and that is not acceptable. In many countries this would be investigated for what it is and would attract sanctions, not least by the professional institutions.
Dear Cheryl,
ReplyDeleteCan I suggest Professor Alan Dunlop? He advised the BBC on Edinburgh Schools and the Cole Report and, more recently, on the new Edinburgh Sick Kids Hospital.
I seem to remember he presented an hour long TV documentary on Edinburgh Schools and so he knows more about visual inspection reports than almost anyone.
You would only be asking him to review the information sent yesterday, which is now complete, and to provide recommendations. It would probably take him one or two days to do that.
George - Life was easier for everyone when they were able to say 'not me' and do nothing. Sadly, the EIS were amongst them. Now the parents and teachers know that you only have to ask an independent world expert like Professor Dunlop and you'll get an answer within a couple of days. The last time I saw him on the BBC he was saying that there are systemic problems in Scotland; he was talking about Edinburgh Sick Kids Hospital at the time; The problems are all laid out for him to take a look at here.
ReplyDeleteThe way Norman has set it out was to say: 'this building could collapse at any time' - I have proven that and it is now up to Holyrood and Aberdeen City Council to prove that I am wrong. That explains their current silence.
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteCan you put it in the form of "Parliamentary Questions" please? That way he presumably has to answer. What I had in mind was the following:
1. The ground surrounding Brimmond School is flooding with muddy water and is subsiding. This requires an immediate design check by a specialist geotechnical engineer to prevent a structural failure from occurring. Aberdeen City Council are the school owners and they are continually refusing to do this, despite it being required under law. The Council are not taking any action and are not communicating and so what is the Scottish Government's position on this?
2. The checks which have been carried-out on Brimmond School are all 'visual inspection reports', rather than proper engineering design checks as required under law. The Cole Inquiry of 2017 recommended that Councils stopped relying on visual inspection reports and instead checked buildings properly and independently. Are Scottish Building Standards content that an immediate life-safety risk has not been inadvertently built into this design and has not been identified in any of the visual inspection reports? Many world experts are convinced that it has.
3. Aberdeen City Council has a statutory duty to comply with Design Standards and the Health and Safety at Work Act to provide and maintain safe public buildings. If they fail to do that, as was investigated during the Cole Inquiry, who has the authority to ensure the law is respected and followed by each Council in Scotland?
4. The following is taken from minute 1 of the meeting held between my constituent, Stephen Dick, and the Scottish Government's Bill Dodds and Jonathan Moore. The meeting was witnessed by Gary McAteer from Beltrami and it took place on 17th August 2016: "1) BD stated that the foundations were designed on a presumed available bearing capacity of 150kN/m2. SD stated that the Fairhurst Soil Investigation Report recommends: 'The presence of shallow and potentially upwelling groundwater on the site reduces the available bearing capacity to <75kN/m2." Can Scottish Building Standards confirm that this is correct because, if it is, then the building should be expected to sink?
5. The following is taken from minute 7 of the same meeting: "BD stated that the design was in accordance with BSI Design Standards. SD referred to Table 1 of BS 8004 and stated that the design was not in compliance. He referred also to the statement within BS 8004 that a rising water table results in a minimum 50% reduction in available bearing capacity. On this basis, BuroHappold's design factor of safety is reduced, or perhaps removed completely". Can Scottish Building Standards confirm that this is correct because, if it is, then the building should be expected to sink?
6. Both Jonathan Moore, Fraser Innes of Hub and John Swinney have explained that the design has already been checked by BuroHappold and found to be compliant, stable and safe. Is that true? The design check by BuroHappold has been requested many times by my constituent but it has never been provided. Can it be provided now?
7. My constituent had a 3-hour meeting with Scotland's Head of Building Standards Stephen Garvin on 23rd May 2019 where he handed-over the pertinent design data and explained that a mistake had been made during construction which meant that the building was unstable and would fail. He promised to respond but did not. When will Stephen Garvin respond?
I think we should not give John Swinney any wriggle-room because he will exploit it if we do. I would much rather at this point be very, very specific about the answers we need.
I should have done this years ago....
ReplyDeleteDear Mr Ross,
I attach three photographs with this Email which describe the problem. This is incredibly serious and the photographs show that.
I think this would be best handled by the Conservative Party as Labour control Aberdeen City Council and the SNP control Holyrood. It should be a public interest issue which cuts across party politics and just gets done, but that has sadly never happened.
Have a look at it and let me know if yourself and Mr Jack can do anything to help?
If there is anything in the second version of the PQ's that you think is over-incendiary, then just miss it out. Possibly the second paragraph is? I'm personally OK with it but have a look through it and I'm OK with whatever you want to do.
ReplyDeleteThis might be worth posting up George. See what you think.
ReplyDeleteDear Jackie,
These PQ's are only between 3 and 5 lines of text long. Stephen Garvin cannot understand the question I am asking if they are reduced much beyond that and both are he and John Swinney are looking for any excuse not to answer. What do you want me to do?
George Laird helpfully posted them up on his blog overnight, so parents and teachers can see them already. My expectation is that at least some of them will agree with me and which case they will asking why no-one has done anything about this.
If Holyrood are waiting for bad publicity before they act then there is plenty of potential for it here, isn't there. It is supposed to be a government Jackie, not a nursery school. If 3-5 lines of text are too much then God help all of us.
Have you sent them to John Swinney by Email? That was my understanding of your message last night.
Dear Mr Swinney,
ReplyDeleteI am trying to conclude this matter in the most efficient way possible. I understand that Jackie Baillie MSP has sent you a series of questions recently which can be answered by your Head of Building Standards and when he has done that, you will better understand the problem and that allows you to look for a solution.
The safety of the school is now a matter for the Employer (Aberdeen City Council), the Employees (the EIS) and Government. The Education (Scotland) Act of 1980 sets out the role of the Scotland Office to ensure that acceptable standards are set by Councils and so that explains Government's ongoing role in leading this to an outcome.
Additionally, there is the Health and Safety at Work Act which requires everyone to 'take this seriously'. Basically, no-one can ignore it and that means that there is a duty on all of you to make sure that a proper independent geotechnical investigation takes place. The Health and Safety at Work Act is worded such that there are no get-out clauses for anyone. That has been my experience of it and if you think otherwise, then good luck to you.
The Council and the Teaching Unions can disregard me with respect to the safety of the school, but they cannot disregard Government, whether that be the Scottish Government or the Scotland Office. I therefore propose to leave that situation for you to resolve between yourselves as there is nothing more that I can do.
This all started for me in 2014 when I told the Contractor, who was my employer, that he had changed the design and that the school would no longer work. The building would become inundated with groundwater, the ground would soften and subside and the building would start to sink. I was terminated for doing that and so I repeated the claim to the Council, Hub and to Harper MacLeod. They did not investigate and allowed the school to be built, but as soon as the building was opened in late 2015, it showed signs of being inundated with water, the soil was collapsing and subsidence was occurring. These are all the precursors of structural deformation and collapse. I was called to a meeting with your Jonathan Moore and Bill Dodds in 2016 and I explained to them that the building would inevitably collapse, but they refused to accept that and Jonathan Moore issued the attached letters which explain the Scottish Government's position.
I was called to another meeting in 2019 with your Stephen Garvin and Scott Johnson and I presented the same explanation to them. They have subsequently failed to respond and so nothing has changed and nothing has been done.
I always thought that Jonathan Moore's letters were untrue, specifically the highlighted paragraph in the letter of 30th September 2016. If I accepted these letters, then a collapse would become inevitable and so I made a point of investigating if they were true or not by asking the same question, answered by Jonathan Moore, to a large group of expert engineers from the American Society of Civil Engineers. Their responses are attached (you may have seen them before) and I think you will find them alarming; I know I did at the time. Not one engineer out of approximately 40No agreed with Jonathan Moore. Despite the obvious urgency implied by these responses, nothing has been done to rectify the school and so it continues to function as a non-compliant and therefore unsafe building, used by hundreds of people every day.
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteAttached is the last response we received from John Swinney; it was on 20th December 2017 - so, a long time ago. I think it is fair to say that every assurance set-out in his letter has now been proven untrue and that has sadly taken us 4-years to establish.
Just to reiterate then, the only piece of information that is essential just now is the 'geotechnical design check'. This can be the Fairhurst or the BuroHappold design check and it is up to the Scottish Government which one they select as both are immediately available.
I understand that Harper MacLeod are being encouraged to find a solution to this now. The fastest and most certain way to do that is for the Scottish Government to stop paying them and that has been suggested before, hasn't it? That method works, there would be public support for it, and if there is an alternative means of achieving an outcome then I have not heard of it.
Dear Ms Somerville,
ReplyDeleteWhile we wait on Stephen Garvin responding, let me set-out below the required bearing capacity of the soil underlying the foundations, versus actual available bearing capacity and you will identify the problem straight away. It is really not complex:
1. Required available bearing capacity as per BuroHappold foundation design = 150kN/m2
2. Actual available bearing capacity dry conditions = 150kN/m2
3. Actual available bearing capacity wet conditions = <75kN/m2
4. Actual bearing capacity in areas suffering from subsidence = 0kN/m2
The Hyatt Regency Walkway Collapse occurred because of an error which resulted in a 70% reduction in capacity. At Brimmond School the error results in a reduction in capacity of even more than 70%. At the Hyatt Regency, no-one was aware of the error until the collapse occurred and an investigation took place but, at Brimmond, you are all aware of the error.
Now, back to the subject of whistleblowing. Bob's experience is that this should take no more than 2-months to be concluded. I have waited for almost 8-years and it is still not concluded. During that time, I have been blacklisted while the contractor, Ogilvie Construction, and the law firm, Harper MacLeod, who are jointly responsible for this, continue to be supported by your Government.
I asked that my situation be resolved by last Friday and nothing was done. Can I ask again that this is resolved without further delay, please?
George - I don't know if you saw this or not but there was an interview on last night's Reporting Scotland between Glenn Campbell and Kate Forbes re the £250million Calmac ferries. It illustrates this point very well. No-one at Holyrood understands engineering and employment and the place exists for party politics only. This country used to be world-leading in engineering, education, law and all the rest of it. You've got to wonder at how and why that has all been lost so quickly.
ReplyDeleteDear Mr Jack,
ReplyDeleteI understand that BuroHappold have been asked to advise if the school is safe or not and Harper Macleod have been asked who has liability to pay for the remedial works, that's if remedial works are possible.
Contractually, it all hinges on BuroHappold and no other opinion matters.
They have produced two reports on this school that I am aware of. They produced one before work started in 2014 telling us what to do and what not to do. The Contractor, with the agreement of Aberdeen City Council and Hub, ignored their recommendations and we can all see the results of that.
Their later report was produced almost 4-years later in March 2018 and it was in response to the opinions of the experts from the American Society of Civil Engineers, which was issued in November 2017. That report will tell us if the completed school is compliant, and therefore safe, or not. I suspect it is not safe. It was issued at the time to Hub and to Aberdeen City Council and their respective legal teams but, for whatever reason, it was not issued to the public. This is the report that should be issued now.
I am satisfied that Harper MacLeod represent the majority of lawyers in Scotland in that their profession has been compromised to the extent that it hardly performs any useful function for the public nowadays. That is not the case with BuroHappold. They are one of the world's foremost engineering consultancies for a reason and I would urge everyone to trust and value what they have to say.
The reason that I am addressing this to you is because you, as Secretary of State for Scotland, are responsible for the Devolution Settlement and you should therefore be informed if it is being mis-used to the extent that we in Scotland have less protections than others do in the UK.
If Aberdeen City Council, Hub and the Scottish Government had listened, not only to me but also to BuroHappold in 2014, then this would have been avoided and elsewhere in the UK, it probably would have been avoided. If senior parliamentarians and civil servants lie, as the attachments suggest they have done, and those lies put public safety at risk, then there will be an entirely negative reaction to that. I would ask all of you to look at these letters; should these people really remain in their jobs? Remember - I've been unemployed for the majority of the past 8-years and I am competent and I have not lied. So, it's a question of what public and professional life in Scotland stands for nowadays, isn't it.
BuroHappold will either agree with me, or disagree and it's as straightforward as that. You do not need to wait for Holyrood Ministers, councillors, civil servants, lawyers or anyone else; when BuroHappold issue their report to Jackie, then the process of competently checking the safety of the building is over. Hence, there is nothing left for me to do.
I have asked numerous times now for my situation to be recognized and rectified by the Scottish Government and I keep being ignored. I have asked on each of the past three weeks and no-one has responded. I presume it is the same dead hand of John Swinney that is holding me back and is holding everyone else back too. Can he be removed from the equation please? I think that would suit all of us and would allow this to be finished at long last.
Kind Regards,
S. Dick
Dear Mr Jack,
ReplyDeleteI attach a summary of the 2017 Cole Inquiry into the Safety of Scotland's schools. I have sent this to you all several times before. The Institution of Civil Engineers, the EIS, Hub, Scottish Councils and the Scottish Government all provided submissions to the Inquiry and so you are all aware of it. After it was issued, Audit Scotland advised all Scottish Councils to follow its recommendations and so they are aware of it too.
What I would like to refer you to is on page 62. As soon as Edinburgh City Council became aware from experts that the schools were non-compliant and therefore unsafe, the decision to close them was made instantly by the Leader of the Council and that decision was commended by Professor Cole. We can tell from the letters below that the Leader of Aberdeen City Council has an entirely different understanding of her responsibilities with respect to Scottish Law.
In our case, the expert opinion has been submitted, by BuroHappold, to Aberdeen City Council and Hub. If the Leader of the Council is continually refusing to act and the Scottish Government are refusing to act (see the attached letter from the present Education Minister Shirley-Ann Somerville, which demonstrates this) then presumably the responsibility falls on you to instruct them what to do and what standards to follow?
As you know, I want to end my involvement now and so please do all that you can to ensure this is the last Email I have to send.
Dear Ms Somerville,
ReplyDeleteI assume the design reviews by BuroHappold were issued today? These are from a respected Director of Engineering and I expect them to concur with my opinions and with those of the expert members of the American Society of Civil Engineers which I provided in 2017. Let me know please if they don't.
So, we now know if the school can be remediated or not and, if so, what has to be done to drain and stabilize the ground and I will leave that to be taken forward from here by the Teaching Unions. They may also want to know for example if the school is safe in the meantime, but that is for them to establish.
My career in construction was ended after my meeting in August 2016 with your Jonathan Moore and Bill Dodds. The minutes of that meeting are trailing and you can now see that Mr Moore and Mr Dodds were lying to me. I knew that at the time and, sadly, it has taken me many years to prove it. It is fortunate for those attending this school every day that I have persisted as it is clear that no-one else was going to do it.
I attended that meeting with Gary McAteer who is a Glasgow Advocate lawyer and I have asked him to resolve this case to a satisfactory outcome by Friday 8th April. Has has not confirmed yet, but now that the BuroHappold information has been issued, that situation changes and we are now in a position to resolve everything.
Can I suggest that I meet with Mr McAteer this Friday as planned? As I make clear above, my situation is the Scottish Government's responsibility to resolve and so you may want to have someone present also; that is for you to decide.
Let Mr McAteer know please and he will confirm to me.
Dear Ms Somerville,
ReplyDeleteAs I explained on Tuesday, I am expecting to meet Glasgow Advocate Garry McAteer tomorrow to finalize an outcome to this case. As my complaint is about the dishonesty of your employees Jonathan Moore and Bill Dodds, Scottish Government Ministers will have to agree that outcome before the meeting takes place and so can you do that today please so that the meeting can be confirmed.
Dear Ms Somerville,
ReplyDeleteI understand that Jonathan Moore is now Head of your 'Outcome Agreement Unit' and so perhaps he should attend tomorrow?
Going back to the Cole Inquiry of 2017: the safety of these schools was determined at the rate of approximately three schools per day over the period 5th April to 11th April 2016. We are only determining the safety of one school and we have opinions of the highest calibre from the ASCE and BuroHappold for guidance and so there is no reason to delay any longer.
The primary purpose of the meeting will be to achieve an outcome for myself, but the two issues are so closely related that it is impossible to solve one without solving the other and so I will present and explain the ASCE opinions to Mr Moore and he can present and explain the opinions of BuroHappold to me and we will reach an agreed outcome, tomorrow.
Presumably you will require the prior consent of the FM and the DFM and so can you do that please and let me know later today?
Dear Ms Somerville,
ReplyDeletePlease advise if there is a problem in setting-up this meeting?
In terms of compliance with the Education Scotland Act, there is a duty upon you alone to appraise yourself of the safety or otherwise of this school and the situation is that not a single geotechnical expert thinks that it is safe. That means, in terms of compliance with the law, your continuing silence is not an option.
I understand that the school re-opens on 18th April and so there is an understandable urgency to resolve this.
2. Drainage
ReplyDeleteFirstly, the site is waterlogged with an exceptionally high water table and this makes it unsuitable for soakaway drainage and Fairhurst included that stipulation in their Soil Investigation Report. I found it surprising that they went on to recommend this type of drainage in their visual inspection reports. It will not work and it will only make the situation worse by installing permeable gravel in the place of less permeable soil.
The flooding derives essentially from groundwater, rather than surface water and I have made that point several times to you before. If the water is silty, then it is groundwater and most of the floodwater is silty, isn't it. If it is leaving silt behind on the footpaths then it is groundwater. Incidentally, silt is the product of scour and that is what is causing the hydraulic failures.
The subject of draining this site was reviewed by many experts of the American Society of Civil Engineers in 2017 and they recommended a 5m deep system of drains be installed. This is an extraordinary depth, but we've all known about this recommendation for in excess of four years. These are some of the best engineers in the world and I would not expect them all to be wrong. Personally speaking, it doesn't surprise me that there is not some easy and quick off the shelf solution to this. Have BuroHappold been asked for their opinion yet?
3. Building Settlement Markers
There may be one hundred pad foundations in the building. If they all settle equally, then there isn't a problem but they never settle equally and so what that presents is the problem of differential settlement. If they all start to settle by different amounts, then that sets-up stresses all over the building which do not become apparent until a structural failure occurs. That is why I keep saying to you that it is no use looking for cracks, because there probably won't be any cracks until structural failure occurs.
To give you some idea of just how little differential settlement is required to cause a collapse, the Surfside Apartment building in Miami which collapsed last summer was settling by only 1 or 2mm per year and yet that precipitated a sudden collapse. That collapse was caused (it is thought) by tidal water; Brimmond School is suffering from the effects of artesian water, which even more damaging as we can all see.
With respect, I think that you are wasting your time by installing these. Perhaps install them when the deep drains are installed, or whatever alternative solution BuroHappold design for you, but installing them just now appears pointless. Have BuroHappold given their opinion on this?
I have gone over all of the foregoing with the Scottish Government's Jonathan Moore in 2016 and Stephen Garvin in 2019 and so can you explain to me why they are not responding? Why are Hub not responding and why am I trying to explain engineering to Aberdeen City Council's Chief Accountant? It seems extraordinary to me; as if I'm wasting my time. Am I wasting my time?
ReplyDeleteThis is the result of a mistake which was made by the contractor. It was reported at the time to the whole Hub Client Consortium but none of you did anything to investigate. What we should be doing is identifying the mistake now and rectifying it. If the rectification involves installing 5m deep drains then the school will have to be closed to allow that to happen as it is a very difficult and dangerous job. Who is liable to pay for this extra work? The Scottish Government because Jonathan Moore checked it at the time and said there was nothing wrong with it. There was something wrong and I and many other expert geotechnical engineers have explained it many times to you. As I say above, I am unable to sugar-coat this for you and the longer it takes you all to confront this, the worse will be the outcome.
In terms of EC7 deformation of the ground has already taken place and the next limit state failure is deformation and collapse of the structure. In terms of the Education Scotland Act, Shirley-Ann Somerville is responsible for ensuring that this is properly investigated by BuroHappold and the terms of the Contract are followed.
Please respond on Monday with the revised visual inspection reports by Cundall and Fairhurst. I believe Jackie Baillie has asked for Hugh Mallett's opinion and so, when that arrives, it will I'm sure be illuminating for everyone. Basically, Hugh Mallett will advise you all if I am right, partially right, if I have been exaggerating this, or if I am wrong.
Jackie - I haven't passed this on to Hugh Mallett, but perhaps you can ask Lorraine to pass it on on Monday for me. I think we should keep him fully in the picture. Mr Wilson will pass this on to Cundall and Fairhurst. As I say above, schools go back in another week and so the urgency is obvious to all of us.
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteBuroHappold may respond to you as you are a Parliamentarian, but they are no longer a Hub partnering contractor. I do not know the reason for that, but their cooperation should not be taken for granted. Therefore, the shortest route to achieving their response is to use the Contract terms which I set-out below for you:
1. The Contract was written by Harper MacLeod's Euan Pirie and he is responsible for administering it. All inquiries should therefore be addressed to him along with instruction on what you want him to do and when you expect a reply and it is his duty to respond.
2. Advise him that the schools are due to reopen on 18th April and so his response should be returned to you by 12th April, which will allow all of the parties involved to communicate and reach an agreed outcome. My understanding of the various Acts is that the decision should be joint one between the Scottish Government and Aberdeen City Council, with the agreement of the EIS, but Euan Pirie will advise if that is correct.
3. The response you get from BuroHappold should be a PDF, signed by Hugh Mallett and unaltered/unredacted by anyone. It will be sent to you, not directly by BuroHappold, but by Euan Pirie of Harper MacLeod.
4. My comments trailing should be sent unaltered/unredacted to Euan Pirie and it is for him to decide the distribution. He will undoubtedly send them to BuroHappold and to the rest of the Hub Client Consortium, but he may also send them to the Contractor. It is for him to decide.
5. This will not be a visual inspection report and BuroHappold will answer each of the points I make, point for point in a sequential order. I would expect his response to be thorough. This will be the final determination, made by the engineering design consultant with design liability for the civil and structural design and so there is no need for any further opinions beyond that.
6. I mentioned to Shirley-Ann Somerville a few days ago that Edinburgh City Council reviewed the safety of 17No schools in 5 or 6 days between 5th April and 11th April 2016, making the decision to close them on 11th April and so it is certainly possible to make a decision on one school next week but, obviously, there needs to be a dramatic step-change in response time over what we have seen from everyone so far.
7. I have been trying to resolve my situation for each of the past 4-weeks and no-one is responding. I have explained a number of times now that it is the responsibility of the Scottish Government, not the Contractor or anyone else, and so can a meeting be set-up in Gary McAteer's office next Friday with the Scottish Government's Jonathan Moore? At the conclusion of the meeting, I want to walk out of Gary McAteer's office with an agreed outcome and so I presume that Mr Moore will need to be instructed to this effect on Monday? I copy Gary McAteer so that he is aware of my expectations.
If Lorraine wants to call me on Monday to clarify anything set-out above, then ask her to do that please. It may sound as though there is a great deal of pressure being directed suddenly towards Harper MacLeod, but this should have been done years ago and it is indicative of just what a delinquent organization Hub has become when a member of the public has to set-out the correct engineering and the correct use of the Contract to the client team in this way. I attach the last letter we received from them and it still shocks me that this apparent misfeasance is acceptable nowadays in Scotland and, sadly, we are all having to deal just now with the inevitable consequences of it.
Kind Regards,
S. Dick
Can you publish this George?
ReplyDeleteDear Jackie and Ms Somerville,
That's another week gone by and I have heard nothing. I don't know why everyone is finding this so difficult and so let me reprise the situation as follows:
We are all waiting on BuroHappold's opinion. It was produced in March 2018 and has been held since then by Hub and Aberdeen City Council. They are refusing to release it and that can only indicate that a problem exists and they want it to remain hidden. I'm sure that everyone realizes that by now. Can I suggest you both take a look at the opinions of the American Society of Civil Engineers experts; they all explain the problem and they did that a long time ago. It is not a benign, non-urgent problem, which is easy to fix. It is the opposite of that, isn't it.
We have a Contract in place to protect the public; can we just use it for that purpose please? BuroHappold's opinion can be put in front of the Education Minister instantly - just ask for it. The Hub Client Consortium and Harper MacLeod answer to Ministers, it's not the other way around. So, can anyone explain why we are still waiting?
Finally, the situation I have been left in for years is the responsibility of the Scottish Government's Jonathan Moore and I have explained that many times now. I have asked for a meeting to be arranged in Garry McAteer's office, with or without Jonathan Moore present, so that a final outcome can be agreed. Jackie said earlier in the week that she doesn't know anything about a meeting and so can Ms Somerville arrange this with Jackie, Mr McAteer and Mr Moore? Presumably the meeting will take place next Friday but let me know, please. This again is the responsibility of Scottish Government Ministers and so can you arrange it, please.
Hannah - Have the ICE come to any decision on visual inspection reports by structural engineers? Professor Cole unequivocally recommended we stop using them, but the ICE have back-tracked on that and you can see for yourself the problems that is causing. The system is open to abuse I'm afraid and no-one can seem to do anything about it. Can you let us know the ICE's current position on this, please? I, and I'm sure many others, would prefer if we used this example to finally consign all visual inspection reports to the dustbin. They have their uses, but this is not one of them. I have sent the Brimmond examples to BuroHappold and so they can give you their assessment of them but, in my view, they are dreadful and if we are declaring buildings as safe on the basis of this type of information, then we are wrong to be doing that.
Thank you,
S. Dick
Dear Jackie,
ReplyDeleteAt the Cole Inquiry, some lawyers and engineers didn't reply to Professor Cole and if they didn't reply to him, they won't reply to you. The BuroHappold report exists and the Contract exists and that's all that matters. The report can be released today under instruction from the Education Minister and that is what I suggested. This is not complex and it just needs to be done.
With respect, I am not here to do everyone's job for them. This is the work of Government and the recent Cole Inquiry Report explains everyone's role in a few pages. In Edinburgh, I understand they were working 24/7 during the period 5/4/2016 - 11/4/2016 to establish if their schools were safe or not, but that hasn't happened this time, has it.
Jonathan Moore lied to me during our meeting of 17/8/2016 and in his subsequent letters of 30/9/2016 and 7/10/2016. He is an employee of the Scottish Government and if he lied to me about the safety of a school, then he is lying to all of us. That has led to a series of needless outcomes and I have explained them half-a-dozen times now. The EIS can manage the situation in terms of the safety of the school and we can leave that to them now, but I am requesting a meeting with the Scottish Government. Again, it is for the Education Minister, and not for yourself, to ensure that this takes place.
Let me know please.
Kind Regards,
S. Dick
Can you publish this George:
ReplyDeleteDear Cheryl,
Schools go back soon and so I want to make the situation as clear as I can to the EIS and the matter I want to clarify is about communication and the role of the present Cabinet Secretary for Education and the previous Cabinet Secretary for Education:
Presumably, the information from BuroHappold has now been issued. That being the case, you will be pursuing any issues raised therein on behalf of the teachers at the school with the present Cabinet Secretary for Education, Aberdeen City Council and Hub. Some time ago, I offered to answer any requests for information that you sent me, but you haven't sent me any. Nevertheless, that offer remains open now and into the future. As a member of the public, I cannot see any role for me beyond that. There is a problem with honesty and accountability within the Scottish Government and I don't think anyone here would argue with that, but you can only fight that when you have a powerful organizational structure behind you. I do not have that, but your Union does and so it is for you to take that forward from here.
The only matter that I am interested in is settling the personal circumstances that I have been left in by this case and returning to work. My meetings with the Scottish Government have already taken place and I have received letters from the previous Cabinet Secretary for Education, John Swinney and the Scottish Government's Jonathan Moore which clearly set-out the Scottish Government's position. I don't require any further meetings with the present Cabinet Secretary because the matter is now closed and they have reminded me of that many times. The BuroHappold opinion will confirm to both of us if we have been lied to by the Scottish Government (I suspect we already know the answer to that) and, in that respect, the situations are linked because if they have lied to me then they must have lied to you too but, otherwise, they are not linked and they will be resolved separately from now-on.
From here, the EIS can deal with this in whichever way they elect to do so and, whilst I expect to be attending a meeting next week, it will not be to discuss the safety of this school. All of you noted in the distribution for this Email are employed and have a public-facing role to play in ensuring that this is investigated and resolved honestly. I have no such role and I have persisted for so long because there was no alternative (no-one else was going to do it, were they?). However, it is now for all of you to come to a settled position based upon expert advice and to act upon it. I presume that's acceptable to everyone?
The way the Americans look at this is: 'If there is a problem, then get it fixed straight away because if you don't get it fixed, you end-up paying other amounts of money and doing other things after the fact' - ASCE Ethics Case Study 2. That's the situation we are all in now, isn't it. A needless, text-book foul-up then which should embarrass all of you.
Kind Regards,
S. Dick
Raghu Prakash A - Senior Geotechnical Engineer/Geotechnical Manager - Advanced Construction Technology Services (ACTS) | LinkedIn
ReplyDeleteDear Cheryl and Hannah,
The above is Raghu Prakash who helped me put together the expert opinions from members of the ASCE in 2017. If you take a look at his Linkedin page you will see that he considers it to be one of his career highlights; as if his skills as a geotechnical engineer and his association with other great like-minded engineers at the ASCE helped save a new school from certain collapse.
I don't have to tell you that he's dismayed by this farce. Were we not the best engineers in the world at one time? I think we probably were, prior to Holyrood. Nowadays we are best in the world at saying 'NOT ME'. We'll wait to see what Jackie comes back with. She may prove me wrong of course, but she has been consistent over the years, hasn't she.
Kind Regards,
S. Dick
Raghu Prakash A - Senior Geotechnical Engineer/Geotechnical Manager - Advanced Construction Technology Services (ACTS) | LinkedIn
ReplyDeleteDear Jackie and Ms Somerville,
I have sent this to Hannah, Cheryl and Bob already this morning. Raghu is the engineer who helped compile ASCE Comments and Opinions for me in 2017. As you can see, he shows it in his profile of achievements and he assumed at the time that it would be actioned by Holyrood immediately, in 2017. Here we are, more than 4-years later and we appear to have achieved nothing because you are both permanently busy doing other things.
As you can see, he is a geotechnical expert and so are all of the others. Does it not occur to either of you, after all of this time, that we should be listening to the geotechnical experts? Raghu and his 40 or so colleagues? Does the safety of the people who use this building every day never enter your thoughts?
I have sent Hub's visual inspection reports to him and received his reply within a day. I cannot repeat the language of his reply but I passed it on to BuroHappold directly, engineer to engineer so to speak and so we are all set for next week's meeting. No excuses this time please.
The position we are all in at the moment is that nothing can happen without your direction and so we are all waiting.
Thank you,
S. Dick
Let me run this past you. I was advised on this last night by an American:
ReplyDeleteLawyers should have nothing to do with this.
This is engineering and can only be adjudicated on by an engineer.
I am not an expert engineer in this branch of engineering, but I would be deemed competent; certainly someone who should be taken seriously.
I told them not to build this school; to stop and get it checked.
They carried-on and didn't get it checked.
40-odd experts then told them that the school was non-compliant; they ignored them too and carried-on using the school.
We are in a situation now where lawyers have known about this for 8-years and haven't checked with any engineers.
Hence, my complaint on Friday will be directed towards Harper MacLeod primarily.
Raghu,
ReplyDeleteI sent you an Email an hour ago but it has vanished. I don't know whether it has been sent, or not, and so let me try again.
I looked-up your Linkedin page and noticed that you are still displaying the comments and opinions of ASCE experts on the school building in Aberdeen. I hope to have this resolved on Friday and so there is not long to go now.
I have been dealing with the governments of Scotland and the UK over the past years and it has not been easy. Neither will volunteer to do anything and if you don't do it yourself, then it doesn't get done by anyone.
After all this time though, your contribution and that of the ASCE stands-out as the only honest opinion of true experts that we have and, for that reason, I think it is sensible to go back to you for a final opinion on this.
I have been sent the attached 3No Visual Inspection Reports by structural engineers by the Scottish Government. I have reviewed them and the comments are my own. Are you able to have a look at them and let me know what you think?
The Visual Inspection Reports are by structural engineers who do not appear to me to have any idea what they are looking for.
I'm copying-in Bob Matheson who is reviewing this case too. He was involved at the time we were putting this together in Riyadh and so he is a professional guy who just wants to see this resolved.
Let me know how you are getting-on out there now?
Kind Regards,
Steve
Dear Bob and Jackie,
ReplyDeleteI sent the Scottish Government's Visual Inspection Reports to PE Raghu Prakash in Saudi Arabia a short time ago. He will review the Reports, with my comments, and respond.
I think that it is prudent to do this now, rather than wait any longer on the Scottish Government doing it.
Kind Regards,
S. Dick