A Practical Guide to Construction Adjudication. By James Pickavance. Wiley Blackwell, 2016. ISBN: 978-1-118-71795-0. 768 pp. £64.95/US$93.83/€87.70.

Historically, contractors in construction projects were at the mercy of project owners and head contractors as concerned their access to progress payments for project works. An attempt to compel payment by means of an arbitral award or court judgment was a costly and lengthy endeavour. Rampant insolvency in the industry throughout the 20th century brought to light the urgent need for a better approach.

Against this backdrop, statutory adjudication schemes were implemented in the United Kingdom in the 1990s, granting contractors a statutory right to progress payments, and a fast-track procedure for claiming them. Statutory adjudication has since proliferated more broadly among other Commonwealth jurisdictions including, most recently, the 2013 Irish Act which is yet to take effect. Equivalent schemes are currently under consideration in other parts of the globe.

It is in this context that James Pickavance presents A Practical Guide to Construction Adjudication. The text focusses primarily on the United Kingdom’s statutory scheme, but also offers a chapter dedicated to each of the other schemes enacted abroad. Commendably, the work offers a number of practical tools in the form of recommendations, checklists and a range of useful appendices, which make it a desirable implement in the arsenal of all construction industry participants.

There are two questions that come to mind when initially approaching the task of exploring a legislative scheme. Simply put: what is its objective and by what means does it achieve this? Irrespective of whether or not statutory adjudication is unchartered territory to its reader, Chapters 1 and 2 satisfy its readers’ immediate needs with an introduction to the rationale for and objective of statutory adjudication, its key features and its evolution over the past decades.

The practical tone of the text becomes clear immediately thereafter, with Chapter 3 which is captioned, “Deciding to adjudicate”. The chapter advises in depth on important questions such as “Do I have a claim?”, “Is it worth it?” and “Who to involve”. Chapter 3 also usefully covers adjudication involving insolvent parties, a subject which is often not fully understood.

In this same vein, Chapter 8 of the text is titled “Adjudication strategy”. It could perhaps be best described as reminiscent of Master Sun’s The Art of War. It is an enthralling segment that deals with such strategies as “smash and grab” and “cherry picking”, as well as “reverse ambush” tactics. The advice set out therein is concise and pertinent, and readers will no doubt be engaged from its start to finish.