Exploring the Contractual Arrangements Associated with the Adoption of the Modern Methods of Construction in the United Kingdom

Abstract

The challenges imposed by the construction industry have, for decades, pressured research and practice to consider the adoption of innovations as means of constructive change. An increasingly emerging technique of construction that shifts key processes offsite is a construction methodology that maximises control. Such an approach is described as the Modern Methods of Construction (MMC), a term that has been widely utilised as a reference to practices that drive less site labour, fewer on-site activities, and maximum offsite and premanufactured value. Such fundamental change in how construction normally operates is logically accompanied by inconsistencies with the contractual arrangements. However, limited research focuses on how traditional arrangements are shaped and amended to suit the offsite anecdote in terms of contract form, contract type, procurement strategy, common changes, and legislation's role. A change in traditional processes would reasonably mean a change in the formal agreements, a research gap that motivates this paper to deem this exploration as timely and necessary. A qualitative research method has been utilised to approach forty critical positions of influence in the United Kingdom such as CEOs, COOs, managing directors, managers, and other decision-makers in businesses categorised as MMC firms. This is considered the first study to explore leaders' viewpoints to better understand how contractual arrangements flow to facilitate, or undermine, MMC in the construction industry. Results suggest that JCT, Design and Build, and bespoke amendments in the payment mechanisms are the preferred contractual arrangements when using MMC. Moreover, the findings indicate that the success of these arrangements is conditioned to early involvement and collaboration between supply and demand.

Modern methods of construction (MMC) and innovation negativism in the UK public sector

“…The modern methods of construction (MMC) primarily focus on changing the uncontrolled nature of construction processes by introducing the element of control (Saad et al, 2023a, b). The implicit includes both onsite and offsite techniques that leads to a significant reduction in onsite activities (Sutrisna et al, 2018), dependency on skills (Ginigaddara et al, 2021), carbon reduction (Koronaki et al, 2021) and delays (Saad, 2023). The MMC guidance is a document published as a supplement to the revised Construction Playbook (HM Government, 2022), defines MMC as "a wide term, covering a range of offsite and onsite techniques.…”