Bridging the gap between policy and practicality

By Emma Peterson. 

Gary Walpole discusses advocacy, legislation and the roofing industry. 

Roofing associations like National Federation of Roofing Contractors (NFRC) are critical to the success in advocating for the industry.  To learn more about how these associations unify the industry into one collective voice, we sat down with Gary Walpole of NFRC for an episode of Roofing Road Trips®. 

Gary has been a part of NFRC for a decade now and is currently their technical safety, health and environment officer. When we asked him how NFRC acts as an advocate for the roofing trade, he described the association’s strength as “bridging the gap between policy and practice.”  

What does that mean? Gary explained:  

If you think about health and safety regulations, legislation always gets updated. A great example is the Safety at Work Act, which came in in 1974 and has since become an overarching act with other legislation included in it. And every time that act changed, it was something Parliament wrote and approved. What NFRC does is make sure that the reality of how a change will impact contractors stays in the approval conversation.  

How exactly is NFRC’s team able to do this? Their officers, like Gary, have backgrounds in the field. For example, Gary has been in the industry as a tradesperson since he left school, with a specialisation in flat roofing. His colleague Bob Richardson, NFRC’s head of technical and training, comes from a sheathing and cladding background. By combining their backgrounds in the trade with their current jobs as advocates and researchers, NFRC’s team can make sure that legislators making changes in Parliament hear and truly understand how what they’re doing impacts contractors everywhere.  

Listen to the whole episode or Watch the recording of the interview to learn more about how NFRC bridges the gap between policy and practice.