Paul Dring Morrell (born 28 February 1948) is an English chartered

quantity surveyor A quantity surveyor (QS) is a construction industry professional with expert knowledge on construction costs and contracts. Qualified professional quantity surveyors are known as Chartered Surveyors (Members and Fellows of RICS) in the UK and Ce ...

, former senior partner of Davis Langdon, and from November 2009 to November 2012 the UK Government's first Chief Construction Adviser.

Career

After graduating from the College of Estate Management, Morrell joined construction consultancy

Davis Langdon Davis Langdon was a construction consultancy company originally founded in London in 1919, which grew to approximately 2,500 employees working in over 18 countries worldwide. In October 2010, the company was acquired by AECOM, with its operation ...

, and worked on major construction projects in both the public and private sectors, with a particular emphasis on arts projects, hotels and commercial developments. He eventually became senior partner, before leaving in 2007.Columnist profile
''Building Design'' (accessed: 3 March 2012) Morrell was a founder member of the British Council for Offices (president in 2004–2005), is a Fellow of the

Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) is a global professional body for surveyors, founded in London in 1868. It works at a cross-governmental level, and aims to promote and enforce the highest international standards in the va ...

and Honorary Fellow of the

Royal Institute of British Architects The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) is a professional body for architects primarily in the United Kingdom, but also internationally, founded for the advancement of architecture under its royal charter granted in 1837, three supp ...

, and has served as a commissioner on the UK's

Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment The Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment (CABE) was an executive non-departmental public body of the UK government, established in 1999. It was funded by both the Department for Culture, Media and Sport and the Department for C ...

(2000–2008; also serving as deputy chairman). In the 2007 ''

Building A building, or edifice, is an enclosed structure with a roof and walls standing more or less permanently in one place, such as a house or factory (although there's also portable buildings). Buildings come in a variety of sizes, shapes, and func ...

'' Awards, he received the Award for Outstanding Contribution to the Construction Industry. He was appointed OBE for services to architecture and the built environment in the

2009 New Year Honours The New Year Honours 2009 were announced on 31 December 2008 in the United Kingdom, New Zealand, Cook Islands, Barbados, Grenada, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Belize, Antigua and Barbuda, and Saint Christopher and Nevis,Saint Christopher. to ...

list.

Chief construction advisor

The "creation of a post of Chief Construction Officer" was recommended by the House of Commons

Business and Enterprise Select Committee The Business and Enterprise Select Committee was a Select committee (United Kingdom), select committee of the British House of Commons, House of Commons in the Parliament of the United Kingdom. The remit of the Committee was to examine the expendi ...

in July 2008. Paul Morrell was appointed to this pan-departmental role, with a slightly revised title of 'chief construction advisor', in November 2009; the role was initially for two years, and Morrell was re-appointed for a further term in October 2011. The UK government directly or indirectly provides around 40% of the construction industry's workload so its influence as a client is significant. Morrell has also been keen to improve the efficiency, cost-effectiveness and sustainability of construction work for the UK government; he led the UK Government, Innovation and Growth Team, that produced an influential report, ''Low Carbon Construction'' published in November 2010. He was also the instigator of the ''Government Construction Strategy'' (published in May 2011) which, echoing the earlier Latham and

Egan Report The Egan Report, titled ''Rethinking Construction'', was an influential report on the UK construction industry produced by an industry task force chaired by Sir John Egan, published in November 1998.Egan, J. (1998) ''Rethinking Construction: Repor ...

s, told the sector to work more collaboratively and to use information technology – notably

building information modelling Building information modeling (BIM) is a process supported by various tools, technologies and contracts involving the generation and management of digital representations of physical and functional characteristics of places. Building informatio ...

(BIM) – to support the design, construction and long-term operation and maintenance of its built assets. Morrell is a strong advocate of BIM, having publicly backed its use in 2010, and BIM was made mandatory for all centrally-procured public sector construction projects from 2016. In March 2012, it was reported that Morrell would step down from the advisor role in November 2012, prompting the start of a search for his successor. In July 2012 it was announced that civil engineer and former ICE president Peter Hansford would take over as chief construction adviser after 30 November 2012. Morrell was an invited lecturer on the Interdisciplinary Design for the Built Environment masters programme at Cambridge University.

Edge Commission

Paul Morrell was the author of ''Collaborating for Change'', an April 2015 report published by the Edge Commission on the future of professionalism among the built environment institutions.Collaboration for Change: The Edge Commission Report on the Future of Professionalism
, Edge Commission, April 2015. Accessed: 28 August 2015.

Training boards

In October 2016, the government's skills minister Robert Halfon appointed Paul Morrell to lead a review of industrial training boards, with the future of the Construction Industry Training Board (

CITB The Construction Industry Training Board (CITB) is the industry training board for the UK construction industry. History The CITB was established on 21 July 1964 by the Industrial Training (Construction Board) Order 1964,Explanatory Note to The I ...

) central to the review. The report ''Building Support: the review of the Industry Training Boards'' was published in November 2017.

Construction product testing review

In April 2021, Morrell was appointed by housing secretary Robert Jenrick to chair an independent review of current systems for testing construction products.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Morrell, Paul 1948 births Living people British civil servants Chartered Quantity Surveyors English surveyors Officers of the Order of the British Empire Quantity surveyors Fellows of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors