The organisation did not have its own stand this year, but instead based itself on the UK Green Building Council pavilion and used the event to host networking lunches with key construction sector and government decision makers and to provide speakers for the massive show seminar and presentation programme.
"It has been a very positive, productive event," said recently elected UKTFA chairman Lawrence Young. "For a long time we were on the back foot over the construction site fire issue, but now our Site Safe initiative is up and running, and we have new products in our armoury, we’ve moved on from a defensive stance – and our chief executive Andrew Carpetner is getting us to the right tables."
The UKTFA’s message to construction and government is "rethinking the way we build houses".
"We need more prefabrication to meet energy performance standards and to focus away from immediate build costs and price to future cost, as self-builders in particular already do, taking into account energy use and life-cycle analysis," said Mr Young. "Too many homes using traditional methods are built down to a minimum standard."
The UKTFA, he added, is also evolving to reflect the growing maturity and diversity of timber construction.
"We’re now also welcoming members from the glulam, CLT and SIPs using sectors," he said. "And having increasingly good relations with architects and being invited into the inner sanctum by companies like Barratts, we’re also now building links with tier two housebuilders who we believe could be receptive to change."
