Now we’ve got it from the horse’s mouth. For some time we’ve had anecdotal evidence that the government’s departments and agencies were not following its guidelines on which certification schemes to accept as proof of timber sustainability. A survey by the Central Point of Expertise on Timber (CPET), which drew up the guidelines, has now spelled it out. It found that nine out of 14 of these bodies had devised a timber procurement policy all of their very own. Frankly, that is absurd.
Under the CPET rules, government bodies must accept the FSC, PEFC and SFI and CSA certification schemes as proof of timber’s legality and sustainability. The MTCC scheme is classed as proof of legality, while other environmental credentials are arranged in an acceptability pecking order.
But all this seems to have passed many government bodies by. One says it accepts only FSC timber, or material with chain of custody documentation approved by a BRE consultant, another that it goes for “sustainable where possible, moving to 100% FSC”.
Several also say that they “go beyond government procurement policy”. That is the most astonishing response of all. Who says that they can go beyond government policy and on what basis do they formulate their own? On top of that, how do suppliers know what each organisation’s policy is?
Having government saying one thing on timber procurement and its departments and agencies saying something entirely different, is a recipe for chaos. It means specifiers and contractors have to look at the materials they use for government work on a job by job basis and many, no doubt, will default to an FSC-only strategy for an easy life. The government had also hoped that, in establishing a single government-wide procurement policy, local authorities would be inspired to adopt it too. As things stand, that seems highly unlikely to happen.
It clearly makes sense for one policy to apply across government. That policy can then be easily and effectively communicated to local authorities so it’s easier for them to adopt it than waste resources on developing their own. The government is now apparently giving CPET a “proactive” remit to tell its departments what they should be doing. Better late than never, I suppose.
