On the 3rd of July this year, the Queensland Government, spearheaded by Jarrod Bleijie and with the assistance of the Commission of Inquiry into the CFMEU dropped the latest version of a building code on the Queensland construction industry, one that threatens to derail the construction of the 2032 Olympic Games.
The reason I say latest version is because I think it is worthwhile going back through our dealings with building codes over the last 10 years.
When Tony Abbott came into power back in September 2013 the first thing he implemented was a royal commission into Trade Union Governance and Corruption in March 2014. No adverse findings were found against any trade union or official, but it did launch an industrial building code for the construction sector and recommended the reimplementation of the ABCC.
This code was used to restrict unions and remove fundamental protections and conditions of workers by restricting what could be put into our EBA’s. Clauses like apprentice ratios, the restriction of labour hire, 6 weeks maximum for casual employment and many more all became illegal under the code and had to be removed from our agreements, or those contractors would not be able to tender on any project that had federal government funding.
In 2016, after the State Labor government had been returned in Queensland, we asked them why they couldn’t put a similar building code in place, but instead of using it to reduce standards of safety and training and put downward pressure on wages and conditions, they would use it to apply the Best Practice Industry Conditions to the building and construction industry (BPIC).
All we wanted was a code that said if you want to tender on State Government projects you must have a Union EBA, but that wasn’t allowed, so over several years of negotiations with government we ended up with legislation that reflected our EBAs, and if contractors wanted to tender on State Government projects over 100 million they would have to meet the conditions of that legislation. The easiest way to do that was to come and do a union EBA.
So, all we did was take the LNP’s building code that they used to hurt workers and profit builders and developers and implement a building code that looked after workers and took away the builders’ ability to win the tender of a job on how little they could pay their workers, a race to the bottom. Because that’s what good labor governments do they look after workers.
Whilst in opposition Crisafulli and Bleijie started attacking BPIC, labelling it the CFMEU tax and claiming it would push up the cost of construction by 30%, a figure they just pulled out of their arse. The simple fact is that no builder was going to build a $100 million project without using EBA contractors, therefore labour costs would be the same with or without BPIC.
When Crisafulli came into government and with the CFMEU being in administration the first thing they did was get rid of BPIC, the next thing they did was a commission of inquiry into the CFMEU (sound familiar). And now, straight from the commission, that’s right, they haven’t even waited for it to finish, they have dropped counsel assisting submissions on the re-introduction of a code of practice and an independent regulator or as we know it a state building code and a state based ABCC.
Just some of the restrictions laid out in this code, parties are prohibited from coercing or pressuring another party to make over award payments, payments to industry superannuation, redundancy and income protection funds which provide for contributions in excess of award or legislation are prohibited, no ratios of apprentices, provisions that impose a site allowance will be non-compliant, no prohibiting of all in payments, no restriction on an employer’s short or long term labour requirements (including casual labour, part time labour or labour hire) just to name a few. Under this code it will be illegal for a builder to apply coercion or unduly influence a contractor into project-specific wages and conditions, and a project agreement can only be agreed by the minister.
So, we can’t use our EBA’s because they won’t comply with the code, we had started to negotiate with the builders about project agreements that might give them some flexibility around hours of work and RDOs, but now we can’t even do that. So why would we do anything except stick to our current EBA’s that were negotiated and agreed in good faith with the employers, that are registered federally and comply with the Fair Work Act. If Jarred Bleijie wants to disadvantage our contractors because of that, well good luck getting your Olympics built Jarrod.
It seems to me the only difference between Labor’s building code and the LNP’s building code is Labor’s was Best Practice Industry Conditions and the LNP’s is Worst Practice Industry Conditions.ise through solidarity to improve our workplaces.
In total, our members undertook 71 days of protected action, 22 of them under a s471 notice, putting members in the position of forgoing pay in order to participate in action. These s471 notices, along with the large volume of suspension applications, all submitted on Friday nights, are tactics we now know to expect in future disputes.