Final Report-BER Implementation Taskforce

Building the Education Revolution
Implementation Taskforce: final report.
Commonwealth of Australia, 2011.


Released in July 2011, the Taskforce's findings include: “The NSW and Victorian governments were responsible for delivering 37 per cent of the program. Education authority complaints as a percentage of all BER complaints=51.51% for NSW Government Schools (as at 3 May 2011)

We believe their poorer performance [than that of other states]  on both cost and observed quality has been influenced by the  hollowing out of public works capacity over the last 20 years,
which has limited the ability to effectively manage an outsourced delivery model.


Their school communities were also disenfranchised. It was a mistake not to embrace school communities more effectively in decision making.

A proportion of schools could have worked directly with a managing architect to self manage their projects. Quality would likely have been higher, the schools would have had some involvement
and complaints lower. 
(p. 12.) 


Summary of the five Recommendations:
1. Education authorities are due to receive final tranches of federal funding on 7 September 2011.

2. The Taskforce is sufficiently disappointed with the low level of inclusion of environmentally
sustainable design (ESD) features in P21 projects. To deliver an achievable and relatively simple metric which could make a significant impact, the Taskforce recommends all future school buildings require calculation of a predictive energy use (kWh per m2 per annum) and CO2 emissions (kgs per m2 per annum) prior to funding approval and that the latter must be initially 20 per cent below a national benchmark with a schedule of increasing reduction targets for the ensuing 5 years.

3. The Taskforce recommends that DEEWR, through the Standing Council of School Education
Ministers, develop and implement a national mandatory policy on air conditioning in all
government schools such that regional inconsistencies around borders are eliminated and to
ensure that energy efficient approaches are adopted. Once such a policy is in place, school
communities should not be able to compromise the integrity of these ESD features of school
buildings via the retrofitting of alternatives such as split systems.


4. We have however witnessed deficiencies in the quality of workmanship, in project management, in public works capacity and in the framework of private certification. Australia confronts a significant infrastructure and maintenance spend over the coming 20 years. The Taskforce recommends that the Productivity Commission update its work on the construction industry.                                 
adapted from http://www.nswtf.org.au/files/libbulaug2011.pdf



5. We recommend that the Australian Institute of Building Surveyors (the peak professional body
representing Building Surveyors in Australia) review the work of the Taskforce and incorporate
the lessons within future compulsory professional development training material for its
membership with the aim of enhancing the public confidence of the integrity of the private
certification process.