Attaining zero defects within the UK's building schools for the future programme : stakeholders' perceptions

Until its demise in July 2010 The Building Schools for the Future (BSF) programme represented the biggest single UK government investment in school buildings for more than 50 years. One of its key goals was to ensure that pupils learn in high quality 21st-century facilities that are designed or redesigned to allow for educational transformation in historically underperforming schools whose pupils were often enmeshed in depravation and social exclusion. This represents a major challenge to those involved in the delivery of the new or refurbished schools. This paper explores the extent to which schools completed under the umbrella of BSF lived up to the UK government's ideology of 'value for money' a key parameter of which is the delivery of high quality buildings. Drawing on an embedded case study methodology based around one local authority that completed nine secondary schools under the BSF funding model between 2006 and 2010 the findings portray the many challenges faced by constructors in the pursuit of zero defect construction. Critical to this, the authors argue, is the approach used by stakeholders to define and measure the presence of a 'defect'. Analysis of exploratory interviews undertaken with four key project stakeholders give evidence of the very different views each professional holds of both quality and what constitutes a defect. By highlighting a lack of consensus between industry stakeholders as to what constitutes a 'defect', how that is to be measured and at what point in the project this should be formally recorded, the research findings raise important questions about the construction industry's ability to deliver projects free from defects.