Urgent need for new code, say builders

    EWIN HANNAN and RICK WALLACE
    The Australian
    March 24, 2014


THE nation’s builders have urged the Coalition to fast-track controversial changes to the construction industry code, warning that they need the intervention to withstand union pressure to cave in to new enterprise agreements containing restrictive work practices.

But Labor and the Greens signalled yesterday that they would not support the passage of the code through the Senate, prompting employers to accuse the opposition parties of condoning union coercion and intimidation.

Master Builders Australia yesterday seized on comments by Employment Minister Eric Abetz in The Weekend Australian that he wanted to break the “closed shop” between head contractors and the Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union by reviving the Work Choices-era building code.

Senator Abetz said the code, which he promised to release “relatively shortly”, would seek to prevent employers getting commonwealth work if they struck workplace agreements with “restrictive” work practices.

The new code, to be based on the Howard government’s controversial 2006 guidelines, would potentially force the removal of clauses in agreements that relate to outsourcing, contracting, use of labour hire and union rights.

Employers in Victoria said they hoped the code could be used to reduce the 20 rostered days off that apply across the state’s construction sector, claiming that the current 36-hour-week industry calendar left the sector dormant for considerable periods of the year.

The Weekend Australian revealed deep concern among contractors that they were being forced to sign up to generous union agreements to secure work in the building industry.

Nigel Hadgkiss, the director of the Fair Work Building and Construction national industry watchdog, said it was a “widespread practice” for head contractors to strike agreements with unions and then require smaller contractors and sub-contractors to sign up to the same agreement if they wanted work on a project.

Wilhelm Harnisch, the chief executive officer of Master Builders Australia, said the “clear feedback we are getting is that the builders want the code reintroduced as soon as possible”.

“There is a high sense of frustration that it has not happened,” he told The Australian.

“The reason for that is a lot of builders are being pressured to sign new EBAs (enterprise bargaining agreements) ahead of the code. The builders are looking for the code to be able to say to unions they won’t be able to sign (agreements) because they will be ineligible for government work.”

Opposition workplace relations spokesman Brendan O’Connor said while the ALP had yet to see the detail of the proposed code, “we would oppose any legislation that seeks to revive core parts of ... Work Choices”.

“The government wants to use its proposed code to put anti-worker fingerprints all over workplace agreements on building sites,” he said. “The government is inching closer to reviving Work Choices with every new attack on ... conditions.”

Greens deputy leader Adam Bandt said yesterday it “seems unlikely we’ll support a return of this intrusive regulation”.

“When the free market works in favour of employees and they lawfully negotiate enterprise agreements, Tony Abbott can’t rush to regulate quickly enough,” Mr Bandt said.

“This is Tony Abbott striking out lawfully agreed protections that he doesn’t like, as well as legalising conduct the courts have found to be unlawful.

“Before the election, Tony Abbott said Work Choices was dead and buried, but he is now trying to smuggle the corpse in through the back door.”

Mr Harnisch, whose organisation has 33,000 members, including head contractors such as Leighton and Lend Lease at a state level, criticised the position of Labor and Greens, saying they were “condoning coercion, standover tactics and intimidation”.

Lawrie Cross, general manager of industrial relations with the Master Builders Association of Victoria, said the government could use the code to influence upcoming bargaining negotiations with the CFMEU.

In Victoria, workers operate under a 36-hour week, working a calendar that includes 20 rostered days off and 11 gazetted public holidays. Negotiations are expected later this year ahead of the current agreement’s expiry in March next year. Mr Cross said the current calendar ensured contractors were “not occupying building sites for vast amounts of time during the year.

“If the government was to take a stance they don’t want contractors tendering for work if they are using any restrictive form of a calendar, then I think it’s going to force the industry to rethink completely how it goes forward with the notion that there ought to be large chunks of downtime as presently exists,” Mr Cross said.

“It’s their code and I think potentially they could insist that contractors come to them with far more flexible and productive arrangements than they currently do.”

“Before the election, Tony Abbott said Work Choices was dead and buried, but he is now trying to smuggle the corpse in through the back door.”         

"they need the intervention to withstand union pressure to cave in to new enterprise agreements containing restrictive work practices"

So they are finally admitting that their virulent pursuit of Workchoices was a disaster, and they should have stuck with the Awards system all along?

And now that they've royally shagged it for all Australians (along with any other number of industry groups) they want the government to get them out of it and enhance their profits by attacking their workers again?

These people are not 'builders' anyway - they are building companies which are bean counters - they have - in most cases - little to no concept of what building is in reality, and they employ qualified Builders on the team on the production side only.

The rest are the modern day equivalent of used car salesmen, snake oil merchants, and fat buck chasers who expect billions at the cost of those who do the work.

"Nigel Hadgkiss, the director of the Fair Work Building and Construction national industry watchdog, said it was a “widespread practice” for head contractors to strike agreements with unions and then require smaller contractors and sub-contractors to sign up to the same agreement if they wanted work on a project."

And this is a problem how?  What?  You don't sit down and negotiate with all interested parties and seek the smoothest way of incorporating all the interests and requirements of a multitude of contractors, through the involvement of a body capable of representing their interests?

All this is Workchoices crazy sauce - all of these major contractors are also employers and thus they themselves seem to feel that their best choice of action is to seek an amicable agreement rather than to pursue the confrontational style of the current crop of Mediterranean style of corporate vulture and parasite mentioned elsewhere on this forum.

Well - you know what? 

TOUGH TITTIES!  You demand that people negotiate rather than receive Award payments and prefer to utilise contractors rather than employees - you take the consequences.

Love it or leave it!

Quote:


Very well said..... who said that?

Sorry re-read....

Telling conviction figures from Howards building industry watchdog.
http://www.theage.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/building-watchdogs-15-p...

yeah, lets waste money repeating this crap while paying no attention to construction site safety!

Something does have to change, Our productivity is nothing but poo and it takes us FOREVER to build anything.

Pantheon wrote on Mar 24^th, 2014 at 1:06pm:



exactly but who are deadset against CHANGE??..

building cannot be sent off shore...

but look whats happened to just about everything else.... we are a small fish in a big pond.. not the other way around..we have to compete.

cods wrote on Mar 24^th, 2014 at 3:05pm:


Cods, darling -any time you wish to compete fairly and have your pension on the same level as Grabasinghe Mahomad Li the fiel' han', just let Uncle Tony and the Toecutters know.....

We're here to save what is left of Australia - and these ghetts are not doing the job.  That's why we're here!

So you reckon Stavros Luigi Obead should be entitled to set up a company, do buggar all, and make billions - and make more by cutting back on payments to workers and on safe conditions?

Let the bosses take up a shovel and stand a watch - that'll shut 'em up!

It's all way too weighted in favour of the bosses here - and wide open to abuse, corruption and exploitation - and you want to make it worse?

The corporate pirates here are making off with billions while Tony cries over Black Holes and threatens pensioners with starvation and poverty and homelessness.

Get a grip!  if they want to earn the money by doing a bludge job at the top - they can step aside and let others on the ladder make a living.

Otherwise GTF off the ladder and stop weighing it down!