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1.2 The calls for greater efficiency

Many Government funded studies on computers and communications in the construction industry were carried out in the 1970's and 1980's. They culminated in a report by the Building Economic Development Committee 'Achieving Quality on Building Sites' 1987, which was based on detailed on-site studies of many live projects carried out by BRE. This report examined factors affecting the quality of building and revealed that the largest single cause of quality problems was inadequate project information.

More recently the reports by Sir Michael Latham 'Constructing the Team' 1994 and Sir John Egan 'Rethinking Construction' 1998 emphasised the need to eliminate adversarial attitudes and practices, and to develop effective team working. Both recognised the importance of good project information, and a major part of the large cost savings projected by Egan are expected to arise from more effective use of IT in the preparation and use of project information.

All of these reports are concerned with promoting increased efficiency in the building process and, taken together, they clearly identify inadequate project information as a major cause of inefficiency.

According to the latest (2001) Government figures construction output accounted for over 6% of the total UK output, which is somewhat greater than the combined outputs of the agriculture, mining, electricity, gas and water industries. Total construction output in 2001 was over £60 billion. It is evident, therefore, that improvements in the efficiency of the construction process should result in significant benefits for the UK economy.

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