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Time for licenced Engineers?

Former Community Member
Former Community Member
As a result of a discussion within a Linkedin group. I had originally raised the issue of the EC UK or IET legally licencing Engineers and had agreed to bring this discussion from Linkedin to the IET members in an appropriate community for a frank and open debate.

​The circumstances surrounding this discussion was the tragedy of Grenfell Towers and my personal observation that some of the alleged decision makers, had no technical qualifications to make decisions on public safety. I am wondering how far the inquiry will go to reveal that issue. 



As I currently work in Canada we do have an act of law governing the conduct of its licenced Engineers and this makes the Engineer have some higher degree of responsibility for public safety.


​Questions

1)    Given the impact of Grenfell, does EC(UK) have to now start considering licencing? What are the perceived hurdles to achieve this?

​2)    If not. What can we do within our profession to improve pubic safety with an objective to prevent another 'Grenfell' ?


I am ​Interested to get IET members responses.

Parents
  • Yes, and I'm surprised that there haven't been more responses to either of them. It's an interesting test case for the ever-running (in the UK at least) "people shouldn't be allowed to call themselves engineers unless they're registered" argument.


    Personally I am far more interested in seeing specific roles and task being licensed / registered rather than vague job titles, which I don't really see as helping anyone. When I'm assessing a safety-critical project I want to know that the individuals in key positions (at all levels) are proven to be competent in their specific domain. But as I mentioned on the other thread, I'm not actually aware whether the protection of the "Engineer" title in some North American areas is actually for that type of public safety protection, or whether it's for unionised closed-shop reasons, I'd be interested to know.


    Cheers, Andy
Reply
  • Yes, and I'm surprised that there haven't been more responses to either of them. It's an interesting test case for the ever-running (in the UK at least) "people shouldn't be allowed to call themselves engineers unless they're registered" argument.


    Personally I am far more interested in seeing specific roles and task being licensed / registered rather than vague job titles, which I don't really see as helping anyone. When I'm assessing a safety-critical project I want to know that the individuals in key positions (at all levels) are proven to be competent in their specific domain. But as I mentioned on the other thread, I'm not actually aware whether the protection of the "Engineer" title in some North American areas is actually for that type of public safety protection, or whether it's for unionised closed-shop reasons, I'd be interested to know.


    Cheers, Andy
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