Russell Cutts has sent us the following letter expressing his frustration with the low level of engineer's fees and the consequential impact on engineer's salaries. I am baffled by your idealistic Utopian and flippant comments following the letters from Dave Hodgson and Alan Burman (15 March). We as an industry in comparison to others are poorly paid, this is not just about the financial sector getting more money, this is about charging fees and providing wages commensurate to the skills we have. I was disgusted by the comments relating to how wonderful and satisfying this industry is. It is not unlike all other industries where 90% of our time is taken up by form filling, email writing and battling with people who think they know better to get our educated and learned point across. Ever since joining the Institution I have been dismayed at the complete lack of realisation that people will not join this industry if they are not paid properly. It is only when we have the guts as an industry to turn around to our clients and demand fees that are comparable to the responsibility we hold and it is the responsibility of the IStructE and the ICE, as our representatives, to use their leverage to force the industry to change. One initial change which would help would be to introduce a minimum wage for graduates of at least 21 000. This would begin to rectify the appalling differences between industries like ours and law for example.
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