BCSA Director General to retire

Dr Derek Tordoff is to retire as Director General of the BCSA at the end of the year after 27 years in the post, President Jack Sanderson announced at the National Dinner.

Dr Tordoff (right) has been with the BCSA for 35 years and has led the Association during a dramatically successful period for the £3,000M a year UK steel construction sector, as it came to dominate the market for single and multi storey building frames, become the default option for railway bridges and capture a still growing share of the road bridges market.

Dr Tordoff said: “It is time for BCSA to have a new chief executive to lead the drive for further growth and commercial success for the steel construction sector. I will not be leaving until the end of the year and during that time there is much to be done. I therefore expect to be as busy as ever on behalf of BCSA to ensure that the Association continues in good shape and to effect a smooth transition to my successor.”

Mr Sanderson paid tribute to Dr Tordoff’s contribution to the success of the BCSA. “Derek will be a hard act to follow. He has been a steady and calming influence over the years, during often challenging times. It has been a difficult task to pull so many things together to allow us to make the progress that we have. He will be sorely missed.”

During Dr Tordoff’s tenure there have been a host of developments leading to an improved service for clients of the sector. Health and safety, for example, has been dramatically improved by the introduction of several innovative measures, leading to a 60% reduction in accidents in the last ten years.

The period saw the enthusiastic promotion by the BCSA of new productivity and quality enhancing technology like 3D modelling, and the use of cad/cam. Long span beams, curving and bending of sections, and developments in protective coatings and fire engineering have also helped make the UK’s steel construction sector the most successful in the world.

In recent years, sustainability initiatives like the BCSA’s Sustainability Charter and the current Target Zero project in support of the government’s carbon reduction strategy have increasingly come to the fore.

Dr Tordoff said: “Perhaps the greatest achievements of the sector during these years have been the improvement in safety and the increase in our market share in multi storey buildings from 30% to 70%. It has been an exciting and sometimes challenging time and I have been proud to have played a part in steel construction’s amazing success story.”