The lack of transparency in a range of public and private statements is a common grievance in conversations among members of the genuinely independent Institution of Engineers in Scotland.
In 2005 the wife of airline pilot Martin Bromiley died when an operation went badly wrong. Later a nurse whispered there had been a cover-up by senior medics. Bromiley argued for a culture change within the NHS and for rapid, air-accident style investigations, when things go wrong.
For engineers what applies to planes applies to anything else that humans manufacture or announce. The priority should be to investigate failures and publish the findings rapidly to all those affected. Punting to the long grass, half-truths and non-truths help no-one and invariably cost supplier or government more in the long-run.
Recent examples include the enquiries into SNP affairs, the Post Office, hydrogen, carbon capture, plastic recycling and the Scottish ferries tragedy.
Governments persisted with plans for domestic hydrogen trials long after the ‘buried’ 2018 report declared it was impractical. Why? Maybe vested interests wanted the available grants or the promised trials were a useful, but false, indicator of dynamic action.
Completion of the two Arran ferries is delayed five years and counting with costs three to five times the contract value. A report costing £620,000 on the crisis has been withheld with the excuse of commercial confidentiality – as if years of mystery and conjecture are helpful for the shipyard. If the issues are so complex, a formal referral for Dispute Resolution could be made.
Half-truths often appear when new technologies are announced as with hydrogen, wave power, carbon capture (where the enormous additional energy generation requirement is glossed over), and wind turbines (where manufacturing jobs were also promised).
We had statements about Scotland having generated 98% of its electricity needs from renewable sources. Misleading! Many were duped into believing sustainable energy supply issues were solved. On Febuary 11th, with low winds, a mere 2,540,000 kilowatts of UK wind energy was generated at times, which is 8% of the UK’s installed 30,000,000 kilowatts. Wind energy without an almost equivalent means of storage is like a furnace with an intermittent supply of coal. The Chinese government wisely requires wind turbine suppliers to simultaneously provide a significant percentage of energy storage.
Some will dismiss the engineers’ wish for greater candour as twee or impossible for ‘Big Politics’ and ‘Big Business’. A very personal story indicates otherwise.
My engineering company had a design problem with some machines; rectification costs would be high. We ignored our German agent’s protest that admitting mistakes was a sign of weakness and told our ‘Big Business’ customer of the issue. They went on to become our biggest customer in Germany. Trust was established; candour is always appreciated.
Planes crash and people die so the need for rapid and open investigation in aerospace is obvious. That approach should be applied as widely as possible.
by Dick Philbrick,
President,
IES