UNITED KINGDOM Association

NEWSLETTER

No 153 July 1998

IPENZ Barbecue Map for Barbecue Home Page
Return Slip for Barbecue
Visit by Warwick Bishop Reciprocality of Qualifications
Seismic lecture by Professor Park
Letter from Jonathan Gammon
Articles for the Newsletter
Dates for Your Diary

IPENZ Barbecue

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Feeling upset at England's loss to Argentina? Disappointed that terrestrial TV showed none of the rugby games down under? Worried whether we will ever have a summer? Come along to Henley Rowing Club on Sunday 2 August and forget your worries while dangling your feet in the water and watching the world go by.

Your new Committee is moving full steam ahead towards the customary barbecue. Last year we visited the fine setting in the Henley Rowing Club grounds on the bank of the Thames. Happily the same prospect beckons this year. All that is required from the social subcommittee, apart from supporting beverages and foods barbecued to their customary perfection is a clear fine day.

Now for the details:

Location: Henley-on-Thames Rowing Club, about a mile from the town centre across the river and right into Wargrave Road (A321) as shown on the enclosed map. Rail travellers use Thames trains from Paddington or Reading.
Date: Sunday, 2nd August
Time: 12.00 noon onwards
Price: £6.00 per head (children free) plus some help please with salads, deserts, and furniture as described below,

Please gather your guests, complete the reply slip and return it without delay so that preparations for your delectation can proceed in good time. Melissa Kirker (Tel 0118 934 2437 in evenings) will co-ordinate your offerings to avoid, as far as possible, imbalances in our provisions. Please let her know what you propose to bring. In general, requirements are:

from committee members and partners - a salad or desert plate
from other members and partners - a desert plate if you wish,
from all of you (if you have them) - some garden chairs, tables, sun umbrellas, games

Finally be sure to come and enjoy a nice day out. Don't forget hats, sunscreen, etc.

Visit by Warwick Bishop

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Those of you who attended the AGM will remember that we still had not received our capitation fees from Wellington for the last financial year. You will understand the measure of consternation that was felt by the committee when we received an email from the IPENZ Chief Executive, Warwick Bishop, to say that our customary capitation fee from IPENZ was not to be forthcoming. He cited as a reason that it was not in his budget and that due to all the staff changes at Head Office over the last year it had been "overlooked."

Fortunately he also said in his email that he would be here in the UK on 30th June for us to discuss the matter further. Despite the rival attractions of an important football game some of the committee managed to turn up for the meeting and discussed the capitation fee at great length.

At present all branches of IPENZ receive a capitation fee from IPENZ which varies from branch to branch. Some branches in New Zealand have reasonable reserves of funds but do less for their members than others. This has prompted IPENZ to review the operations of the branches and suggest ways and means of funding. If possible they would like to remove the current separate branch subscription in the membership fee and include it in the total membership fee. This would increase the fees to some extent but reciprocality of qualifications may dilute this effect. See below.

Having been made aware of our concerns, Warwick Bishop has returned to New Zealand with proposals to increase our capitation fee for future years so that it is in line with that paid to branches in New Zealand. As he had not budgeted for last years capitation fee we will have the same amount as in previous years.

Reciprocality of Qualifications

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Warwick was over here in transit for a forum on Engineers Mobility. This is a forum where the English speaking engineering institutions get together to discuss reciprocality of qualifications and possible reductions in membership fees where engineers are members of more than one Institution. Something of great interest to all of us here. Hopefully there will be more details in the journal.

Currently in New Zealand there is an ongoing debate into the future of the Engineers Registration Board and the role of IPENZ. IPENZ have suggested that in order to practice in New Zealand as a Registered Engineer it is necessary to have membership of IPENZ or an equivalent institution (i.e. one with reciprocal agreement with IPENZ). This would ensure that engineers were covered by an appropriate code of ethics and an obligation for continuing professional development.

As discussed in the editorial of the June journal, IPENZ publish a weekly email newsletter they call an "ezine" to those members who have subscribed to it (contact Claire@ipenz.org.nz please include member number, FULL name, and address).

The ezine for June 19 contained an article outlining the IPENZ Board's decisions in relation to a new Engineers Act. In this article the objectives and broad principles of the Act were outlined. For the next few weeks IPENZ will be consulting with its members, via the ezine to assist in developing further details in relation to a proposed new Act.

Issue One: How would the new Act work?

Register Entry Requirements

To gain professional recognition engineers would go through the IPENZ Professional Review process as it is now. For those that pass the Professional Review this would entitle them to gain entry into the class of Member (M.IPENZ) as well as gain entry onto the NZ register of professional engineers and be eligible to use a post or pre nominal that was protected by statute (e.g.. Reg. Eng. or C Eng. etc.).

Engineers could go through the Professional Review process with another recognised engineering institution in order to gain entry onto the register (i.e. a corporate member of IEAust, IChemE, IEE, ICE, IMechE etc.). If they had been educated and trained overseas, however, they would need to go through some minor assessment process to ensure they now had some understanding of local codes and regulations that affected their practice as a professional engineer in NZ.

Once engineers had passed the IPENZ Professional Review or equivalent they would then self-certify their areas of competence and this would be printed on their Practising Certificate.

Note that in order to gain entry and remain on the NZ register engineers would be required to be Members of IPENZ (M.IPENZ) or a corporate member of another recognised engineering institution.

Issue Two: What Title is Appropriate?

It is anticipated that a suitable title would be protected by statute so that it would be an offence for anyone to use the title who was not on the NZ register of professional engineers and currently holding a practising certificate. This title would be a quality brand so that clients and the community could be assured that those with this title were competent to practice safely and efficiently in their declared area/s of competence. Options include the following: C Eng. (post nominal) Chartered Engineer (Australia, UK), PE (post nominal) Practising/Professional Engineer (USA), P Eng. (post nominal) Professional Engineer (Canada), Reg. Eng. (post nominal) Registered Engineer (Presently used in NZ), R Eng. (post nominal) Registered Engineer, Ir. (pre nominal) Ingenieur (Europe, some parts of Asia).

Please write to IPENZ in Wellington if you wish to know more or would like to contribute to the debate.

Seismic lecture by Professor Park

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About 6 to 8 of our members attended a very interesting evening lecture titled "A Critical Review of International Practice on Seismic Design of Reinforced Concrete Buildings", presented by Professor Park (University of Canterbury), Edmund Booth (Consulting Engineer) and Andreas Kappos (Imperial College) held at the Institution of Structural Engineers recently on 11th June.

Prof. Park was the main attraction to a captivated audience. Firstly, he spoke about the philosophy behind Capacity design for reinforced concrete buildings as developed in New Zealand in the 1970's and how important the detailing was in such structures to resist seismic events. The next topic was the comparison of the major international seismic codes of NZ, USA, Japan and Eurocode 8, and the possibility of working towards one common international code. Both topics prompted a very lively debate, and all were most appreciative of the lecture. If anyone would like a copy of the paper presented, please contact Ian Kirker, who has a copy.

We did not have much notice of this event but were able to send emails to those members with email addresses to let them know it was on. One reply we had was from Jonathan Gammon who could not attend for the reasons outlined below.

Letter from Jonathan Gammon

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Despite what you might be reading about the economy in China, we are frantically busy here in Hong Kong as a result of a "run" of successful bids for major infrastructure projects - mainly highways and railways (above and below ground). The Geotechnical Division, with more than 60 staff, is now about the same size as the entire company was when I started here just over two years ago! Atkins China's total staff now number almost 300, divided between three floors of the World Trade Centre in Causeway Bay and an expanding office in Shenzhen (in the Special Economic Zone, north of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region as we are now called).

Weather permitting (!) good views are to be had from our Causeway Bay offices towards Kowloon peninsula and the ridge of high ground separating Kowloon from the rest of the New Territories to the north. New reclamation extends westwards and eastwards from Kowloon and our proposed 30 ha of new reclamation beyond the current waterfront of "downtown" Hong Kong (Central District, on this side of the Harbour) has just received the go-ahead from Government. Slope engineering remains a major feature of my Division's current work, however. Excitement mounts as the date of the opening of the new airport (Hong Kong International) draws near. We were involved in the design of the runways and other paved areas - a total area, I am told, which is greater than that of the entire M25 Motorway's carriageways. I have yet to check that out!

I hope that all continues to go well for you and for everyone else involved with IPENZ, please say "hello" to everyone there.

Jonathan Gammon

Combined Technical Talk

By the time you receive this newsletter the talk by Tom Elsworth on the JET project will have been completed. Our thanks to everyone who has contributed to it. We will report further in the next newsletter.

England Tour of New Zealand

The All Blacks are playing England, and at half-time the score is 98-0.

At the break John Hart says to Taine Randell "This isn't worth it, you play the second half on your own, and the rest of us are off to the pub."

This is indeed what happens, and when the team get back from the pub, they find that the final score is 113-20, so John Hart asks Taine how the English managed to outscore him in the second half.

Taine replied - "I was doing alright, until I got sent off in the 10th minute."

NZ News UK

Fame at last - Our new Chairman, Graham Barber, has his photo in New Zealand News accompanied by the smiling faces of Ian Kirker and Joanna Saywell. Fortunately the article did not say what they were all laughing at. We will have to see if we can send them more pictures, possibly of the barbecue?

Articles for the Newsletter

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If you have any news for us, events etc. that you would like us to tell people about in the newsletter please email or fax them to the Hon. Secretary and she will forward them to the Newsletter Editor. Feel free to write about the projects you are working on, any differences in British practice compared with NZ, or how you resolved any difficulties encountered.

Dates for Your Diary

Combined Technical Talk Tuesday 7th July 1998
Family Day and Barbecue Sunday 2nd August 1998
Big Ben Visit Thursday 22nd October 1998
Graduates Evening (to be arranged) November 1998
Christmas Party at Australia House Friday 18th December 1998 (note change of date)

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