Anyone who’s been through the education system knows that September marks the real New Year – whatever ‘new’ means today – with university towns inching back to life, children at school in new clothes their parents hope will last all year, surviving department stores working on displays rich in crepe paper and twinkling lights.

At ARB our great staff team is beginning to return to an office which we are confident now meets all the expected safety requirements. I am immensely proud of their efforts this year to contain the disruption that might have attended the pandemic – not only ensuring that every one of our legal obligations has been met, but driving forward our ambitious policy agenda in the face of the twin challenges of home working and the leadership changes that took place in the spring of this year.

Regulators have to take many tough decisions in the course of a year – none tougher than the setting of the Retention Fee. We have set the fee for 2021 at £119 – minimising the amount with a substantial call on our reserves to fund the developmental activity described below and the unavoidable costs of preparing for the EU Exit and expenditure essential to secure the stability and future capacity of our elderly IT platforms. We will report regularly on how your fee helps support the profession through regulation and ensures continued recognition of the high standards of UK architects.

Last time I told you about the five core projects we identified as our immediate priorities. We have now published our Strategic Statement on Fire and Life Safety and are working on our promised further guidance on that subject. We are finalising a similar statement on Sustainability, addressing issues relevant to architects arising from the climate change emergency. Again we will follow this with more detailed guidance.

Alongside this work we are pressing on with plans to address the widely varying scenarios that may arise from EU Exit. The implications for the sector, and for us as regulator, are significant but we know no more than you about what the exact shape of our future working relationship with other European countries will be. The clock ticks and we have assigned staff to keep closely abreast of the issues. We are firmly resolved to secure a way through that minimises disruption, with an orderly transition and perhaps even opportunities to rationalise the arrangements for registering architects who qualify outside the UK. We are looking at various possibilities, one of which might be to establish mutual recognition agreements with some of our counterparts abroad.

Our review of architects’ competence, and how it is regulated, is on schedule and producing interesting early findings. All architects for whom we hold an email address should have received an invitation to contribute to the Architect Survey. If you have already completed the survey, thank you. It’s a unique opportunity for you to help shape our future regulatory model, and it’s vital we hear from as many architects as possible, so be sure to share your views before the closing date of 18 September.

Alan Kershaw

Acting Chair, Architects Registration Board