Previously on Archinect: Protesting Architectural Assistants in the UK are Fed Up: Is the Architectural Education System at Fault?
Over recent months, a conversation about unpaid overtime has risen to the top of the United Kingdom’s architectural discourse, spurred by lobbying from the Future Architects Front. We took a closer look at how the latest debate began, what it uncovered about the prevalence of unpaid overtime in architecture, and what it means for the future of unpaid overtime in the UK and abroad.
In June 1968, civil rights leader Whitney Young Jr. took to the stage of the AIA Annual Convention in Portland, Oregon, chastising the profession for its silence during the turmoil of America’s civil rights movement. “You are not a profession that has distinguished itself by your social and civic contributions to the cause of civil rights, and I am sure this has not come to you as any shock,” he said. “You are most distinguished by your thunderous silence and your complete irrelevance.”
Unpaid overtime: most architects back RIBA crackdown plans
Source: Shutterstock
The RIBA’s plan to ban unpaid overtime at chartered practices has been broadly welcomed by architects, but critics have voiced concerns it will fail to eradicate the problem
The institute has promised to consult on introducing a requirement for all its 28,000 members to remunerate overtime from September.
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It follows a meeting with campaign group Future Architects Front, which earlier this year published an open letter urging the RIBA to do more to tackle a ‘culture of exploitation’ in the sector’s employment of Part 1 and Part 2 students.
Thought working for nothing was a mug’s game, Mr Finch?
Architects have been let down for too long, so why not bury the intergenerational hatchet and back our campaign? ask Future Architects Front’s
Priti Mohandas and Charlie Edmonds
Charlie Edmonds and Priti Mohandas
A few years back there was rightly uproar over the scandal of unpaid internships, whereby architecture practices (and many other creative sector companies) used young people working for free for months with no pay and no promise of a job. While unpaid internships might not be overtly advertised anymore, responses to our survey show exploitative working practices are still taking place under the radar.