Created: 15th December, 2025
Robert joined Barker in 2002 and is a Partner based in our Braintree office. A Fellow of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, he has over 20 years’ experience of all core building surveying services and provides strategic estates advice to key accounts in the education, commercial, ecclesiastical and public sectors.
An education specialist, he provides the following services: estates and energy strategy, asset management planning, project management and capital funding applications.
Robert works closely with clients to plan and implement energy efficiency and sustainability strategies to save money, reduce carbon emissions and meet ESG objectives.
As a RICS Certified Historic Buildings Professional he provides conservation consultancy for clients with listed and historic buildings.
Robert is an experienced APC Assessor and Chairman and is also an external examiner for Anglia Ruskin University
As a Partner Robert leads the Business Development and Marketing function at Barker, builds relationships with key sector bodies and helps steer the strategic growth of the company.
Email: rgould@barker-associates.co.uk
Tel: 01279 648057
Recent reporting on both the free schools programme and the national retrofit scheme highlights a deeper, systemic challenge: public capital projects too often proceed without robust evidence, clear governance or whole-life thinking. These are not political stories. They are reminders of the conditions required to deliver value, safety and long-term performance across the education and public estates.
Alongside these high-profile cases, Barker’s own work across hundreds of schools, trusts and public bodies shows that similar issues can arise at the project level when decisions are made without the right data, due diligence or oversight. Whether in new-build projects, decarbonisation programmes or legacy energy installations, the pattern is consistent: when governance is weak, and assumptions replace analysis, outcomes diverge from expectations.
The Guardian’s analysis of the free schools programme revealed more than £325m invested in facilities that later closed or never opened, reinforcing the need for rigorous demand modelling and whole-estate planning. Capital investment must be led by evidence, not ambition alone.
Barker’s fieldwork reveals a parallel challenge within energy and decarbonisation schemes: installations delivered without a clear understanding of the business case, operating model or technical integration.
Solar PV arrays have been found fully installed but not connected to the electrical infrastructure, effectively generating no benefit. In other cases, systems have been inherited without contracts, documentation or clarity on the commercial model agreed at the time, making it difficult for schools to understand ownership, risk or expected financial return.
These outcomes illustrate why proper feasibility, transparent commercial frameworks and post-installation verification are essential. Even the right technology offers no value if it is not fully integrated, commissioned and understood.
The NAO’s findings into substandard retrofit installations as reported in Building Magazine reflect a wider truth across the sector: quality failures typically stem from governance issues upstream, not just workmanship downstream.
Barker’s experience confirms this. We have advised clients on installations that, although well-intended, were deployed without the necessary whole-building assessment: Biomass systems that are unreliable or have never delivered satisfactory performance due to fuel logistics, maintenance demands or inappropriate system design. Heat pumps installed without the essential pre-work fabric improvements, hydraulic balancing, emitter upgrades or user training, resulting in poor user experience and higher-than-expected operational costs.
These examples are not failures of technology; they are failures of process. They show what happens when systems are procured in isolation rather than as part of a structured, evidence-led decarbonisation plan.
They also highlight the importance of independent technical advice, robust design assurance, and commissioning aligned to performance outcomes, not just installation.
Both the new-school and retrofit stories underline the consequences of unclear governance. Where accountability is blurred, risks can sit unmonitored and undetected until they materialise.
The same dynamic appears frequently in energy and retrofit projects. In many schools, we support:
There is an absence of defined ownership, gateway checks, and clear expectations for post-project stewardship.
Clarity of roles, from client to funder, designer, installer, monitor and maintainer, is essential to managing risk throughout the project lifecycle.
When data and governance gaps go unaddressed, the consequences become evident:
These costs are rarely visible at the point of procurement, but they inevitably surface in the years that follow, often when budgets are tightest, and users most need systems to perform. These outcomes can also be used by those pushing against the climate emergency agenda as evidence to slow down, reduce or cease action altogether.
The good news is that the solutions are well-established. High-performing capital programmes, whether new schools, refurbishments, or decarbonisation schemes, share common characteristics:
These principles sit at the heart of Barker’s advisory approach, helping clients make informed decisions and avoid the pitfalls that can arise when projects are delivered in isolation or without robust oversight.
An excellent example of this has been the collaboration between DfE, LocatEd, Great British Energy, the schools sector, and the delivery partners on the Net Zero Accelerator Project and GBEnergy Solar Partnership, which Barker has been proud to support. This has shown the ability to deliver with good governance whilst still delivering at scale and at pace.
The recent national examples and Barker’s own on-the-ground observations show that technology, funding, and good intentions alone do not guarantee successful outcomes.
It is the strength of the data, the clarity of the governance, and the discipline of the process that ultimately determine whether capital projects deliver long-term value.
By embedding these principles from the outset, organisations can make confident investment decisions, reduce risk, avoid waste, and realise the full benefits of modernisation and decarbonisation.
Better data. Clearer governance. Stronger outcomes. That is how we build trust in the programmes shaping our public estate.
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