As Ciaran Williams explains it has been over twenty
years since the Construction Contracts (Northern Ireland) Order
1997 (the "Construction Order") introduced statutory
adjudication in Northern Ireland and the Construction Order
provides for an almost identical construction adjudication
framework to the Housing Grants, Construction and Regeneration Act
1996 ("HGCRA") in England and Wales.
The Construction Order was amended by the Construction Contracts
(Amendment) Act (Northern Ireland) 2011 which introduced changes to
the payment procedures and removed the requirement for contracts to
be in writing. These changes are similar to the amendments made to
the HGCRA by Part 8 of the Local Democracy, Economic Development
and Construction Act 2009.