8.2.1 There was much evidence provided to the Inquiry as to the significant additional complexity that both ESP, the City of Edinburgh Council, their professional advisors and the building contractors faced following the collapse of the wall at Oxgangs in dealing with the issues of the structural design of the walls of the school due to the absence of 'as-constructed' drawings.
8.2.2 The requirement for ESP and for the Design and Build Contractor, AMJV, to issue sets of 'as-installed' or 'as-constructed' drawings is clearly spelt out in Clauses 9.6.5 of both the Project Agreement and the Design and Build Contract.
8.2.3 In evidence to the Inquiry, several representatives of professional consultancy firms, said that as a point of policy then and now, they are only willing to provide 'final issue construction' drawings as opposed to 'as-installed' drawings. This is as a result of their inability without a significant site presence to confirm the detail of what the contractor actually builds, as changes on site are not always notified to them, particularly under Design and Build arrangements.
8.2.4 It was a generally expressed view, that while contractors may seek to include this requirement into the appointment of design teams, only the contractor was in a position to mark-up drawings showing accurately what, if anything, had changed on site from the drawings issued by the design team members.
8.2.5 Irrespective of how the 'as-installed' drawings are produced, there is a clear requirement in the Contract to supply two copies of 'as-installed drawings' to the Council "…on or before the Certificate date for any project school…" and "to periodically update (these) in accordance with Good Industry Practice."
8.2.6 The Inquiry were unable to establish if properly comprehensive 'as-constructed' drawings had ever been produced, although it would appear from the evidence to the Inquiry, that if they had been, they were not regularly updated.
8.2.7 The absence of accurate as-built record drawings proved to be a major problem after the collapse of the wall and caused significant delay to the teams that undertook the analysis of the existing school buildings and the design of the necessary remedial works. As a result of the non-availability of this documentation, it is likely that some of the remedial work that was undertaken might have been avoided.
8.2.8 As will subsequently become clear further into this Report, there were significant differences between the design details on the limited number of 'final issue construction drawings' that were eventually made available to the Inquiry and what had been actually been constructed in relation to the external walls of many of the schools.
8.2.9 The failure by the contractor, if aware of these changes, to record amendments to the structural reinforcement of the walls on properly produced 'as-installed' drawings or to instruct the design team to do so, would have reduced the usefulness of this information even had it been properly maintained for access.
8.2.10 The Chief Operating Officer of Galliford Try stated in evidence to the Inquiry in relation to the inability to access this information that:
"… these records had been incomplete, inconsistent, and the quality of information relating to each of the schools was so poor that it was felt it could not be relied upon"
8.2.11 It can be seen in a response dated 6th June 2016 to the request for drawings by the Council, that WSP, the structural engineers who had designed the PPP1 schools, had advised the Council that they had not retained a comprehensive record of their information in relation to the schools. They had however ultimately provided some information to Galliford Try in relation to the Phase 2 schools only.
8.2.12 The Inquiry was particularly surprised at the absence of this key information, as one of the main arguments put forward in support of the use of the PPP procurement methodology is the focus on the whole life management of the buildings by the companies concerned. It would seem reasonable to assume that to do so effectively would require the well-organised maintenance and management of accurate records as to the detailed construction of the buildings and that the production and retention of accurate as-built drawings would have been a key objective and requirement of ESP and Amey.
8.2.13 The Inquiry is of the view that insufficient attention was paid by the ESP and its relevant sub-contractors to the accurate documenting, storage and maintenance of 'as-constructed' drawings and related records of the school and that the absence of these led to a more prolonged and probably more extensive remediation process than would have been required had this documentation been readily available as required under the Contract. The primary responsibility for the maintenance of the records lies with ESP.