星空传媒

As a relatively young practising building services engineer who has participated for some time in the peer review process that leads to membership and CEng registration, I think it is a great shame that all of the effort put in by members and staff to ensure that fair and verifiable procedures are in place should be undermined by his comments.

It is unfortunate that fellow members choose to critique a process based on a mistaken belief that decisions are made in 45 minutes. The process includes interviewers thoroughly reading the applicants鈥� papers before agreeing to interview, something I tend to call the 鈥渄esktop check鈥�. I know that in the hour or so spent in the interview, the candidate is encouraged to demonstrate that they have the key competencies required of a professional engineer. It is a very important day in anyone鈥檚 career when they come along for the professional review interview. Interviewers have a great respect for the effort put in by candidates and actively encourage them to describe their personal contribution in achieving the competencies.

I am not aware of Mr Brown鈥檚 personal experience of today鈥檚 institution, but mine, as chairman of the registration panel, causes me to be proud to be associated with it and I shall continue to work to ensure that Mr Brown鈥檚 observations will never reflect the reality of CIBSE.

Vince Arnold, chairman, CIBSE registration panel