During the past few weeks, most of the talk has been about Brexit following the UK referendum in which a majority wished to leave the European union. Political turmoil has resulted and a new UK Prime Minister is in place. The implications for engineering in a UK outside the European Union are complex in the extreme and it will take many months, if not years, to be fully understood and put alternative provisions in place. In the meantime, the engineering community is still debating what a 21st century professional engineering Institute should look like. A number of professional engineering institutions date back more than 100 years and many more still prosper after half a century. The fact that they are still in existence must say something about their survivability and ability to adapt to changing circumstances. Indeed, small institutions are still being formed and this surely indicates that there is a demand for such niche organisations that can service a particular technical subject.
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