A Canberra engineer linked to the Barton Highway bridge collapse in 2010 that hospitalised nine workers has lost a bid to stop restrictions being placed on his licence.
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Jan Ruckschloss has been accused of breaching building standards on eight projects in the ACT including the Barton Highway bridge, Empire Apartments in Forrest and Pulse Apartments in Gungahlin.
As a result, the ACT government threatened to impose a condition that an independent engineer must in future check Mr Ruckschloss' work .
In a letter sent to Mr Ruckschloss in February, the director of the ACT Construction Services Branch, Craig Simmons, wrote that he had ''been associated with significant design failures with respect to [a number of] projects''.
Mr Simmons asked Mr Ruckschloss to explain why conditions should not be placed on his licence.
Mr Ruckschloss took legal action, but the Supreme Court in March rejected his application to prevent the government acting on the threat.
Mr Ruckschloss appealed the decision and asked the ACT Supreme Court to decide if the ACT Environment and Sustainable Development Directorate had the power to impose the conditions.
Lawyers for Mr Ruckschloss argued the government had no legal power to regulate engineers, and thus had no authority to impose the conditions.
But Master David Mossop on Friday found in favour of the government. Master Mossop said the purpose of construction regulation was to protect the public.
''It certainly extends to the protection of the public in so far as they deal with licensees,'' Master Mossop said.
''It is also open, in my view, to regulate the quality of their work so as to protect the broader public, who have not dealt directly with the person carrying out the construction occupation, from the possible consequences of defective or inadequate decisions by that person.
''The fact that engineers are not listed amongst the list of construction occupations does not carve out from the operation of the act an immunity for engineers from any effect that the operation of the act might otherwise have on them.''
Master Mossop found the government was not bound by law to accept the advice or work of a professional engineer just because of its source.
''Fundamentally, the point of the act is one which is designed to ensure that buildings are safe.
''That involves expertise and judgment on the part of all concerned.
''A certifier who receives a certificate from a 'professional engineer' is not bound to uncritically accept it and pass it on.''
