Operating under a Royal Charter, the Engineering Council is the regulator of the engineering profession in the UK. It is responsible for setting the standards of competence and commitment that individuals must demonstrate in order to become registered as professional engineers and technicians.

Working with, and on behalf of the profession, the Engineering Council sets and maintains standards which are internationally recognised and industry relevant. They provide employers, their customers and wider society with confidence that professionally registered engineers and technicians have met the standards set by the profession and will act in society’s best interests. The standards focus on outcomes and what individual engineers and technicians can do.

Standards

The Engineering Council's Standards are internationally recognised and periodically reviewed to ensure that they remain relevant to the profession and society. They have been developed collaboratively with a range of individuals and organisations representing the breadth of the profession, including industry and academia from the many different engineering disciplines. 

The standards individuals must meet to become professionally registered are set out in the UK Standard for Professional Engineering Competence and Commitment (UK-SPEC) and the Information and Communications Technology Technician (ICTTech) Standard. Society can have confidence that professionally registered engineers and technicians have been independently assessed as meeting these standards and have committed to exercising their responsibilities in an ethical and sustainable manner.

The Engineering Council also publishes the educational criteria required for the different levels of professional registration, known as learning outcomes. The learning outcomes to be met by degree programmes for them be recognised by the Engineering Council can be found in The Accreditation of Higher Education Programmes (AHEP) and those to be met by non-degree programmes (including apprenticeships) can be found in The Approval and Accreditation of Qualifications and Apprenticeships (AAQA).

The Engineering Council have recently launched UK-SPEC HRB, a version of UK-SPEC that has been contextualised for engineers  and technicians involved in building work, including design, construction, maintenance and operation. It incorporates the British Standards Institution, Built environment – Core Criteria for building safety in competence frameworks – Code of practice (BSI Flex 8670), which sets out core building safety competence criteria, including fire safety, structural safety and public health.

The Engineering Council works with its partners in the profession to set and periodically review these Standards and following the latest periodic review, revised editions have been implemented from 31 December 2021. A revised edition of the ICTTech Standard has been published and will be implemented by 31 March 2022.

View Standards

Guidance

The Engineering Council produces guidance material covering a range of topics to support engineers and technicians. These guidance materials complement the Standards, and are suitable for engineers and technicians at all career levels. There is guidance on Sustainability, Risk, Whistleblowing, Security and Ethical Principles. These are free to download from the link below.

View Guidance

Brexit

The latest information on the Mutual Recognition of Professional Qualifications now the UK is no longer part of the EU is available on our Brexit webpage, which also includes information for businesses. 

View Brexit information