§ Mr. Boydenasked the Minister of Public Building and Works (1) what progress has been made in ensuring that Government building contracts use a system of preferred dimensions;
(2) what progress has been made in ensuring that building contracts made by local authorities, regional hospital boards and other agencies where Her Majesty's Government meets a substantial part of the cost, make full use of system of preferred dimensions.
§ Mr. RipponGood progress is being made on dimensional co-ordination. The first task is to work out a system of preferred dimensions for houses, educational buildings, hospitals and offices, with particular reference to industrialised methods of building. This is being done by my Ministry, together with other building Departments and the Building Research Station.
In February my Ministry issued Statement D.C.1., setting out the framework of preferred increments on which subsequent work is being based. In September my Ministry published Statement D.C.2. and the Ministry of Housing and Local Government published its Design Bulletin No. 8; which recommend preferred dimensions for the principal components in housing. These statements 201W have been commended to local authorities and hospital Boards. Work on preferred dimensions for the other three types of building is well in hand.