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"The Australian Industry Group welcomes Parliament's rejection of Labor's disallowance motion for the Code for the Tendering and Performance of Building Work 2016 (Building Code 2016). The Code is playing a vital role in ensuring that work practices on building sites are productive and safe," Innes Willox, chief executive of the Australian Industry Group said today.
"For months, the construction unions have been refusing to re-negotiate enterprise agreements to ensure Code-compliance, in the hope that Parliament would disallow the Code. There is now an extremely tight timeframe for the negotiation of more than 1,000 construction industry enterprise agreements. There is not a day to waste. The unions need to start supporting and facilitating the varying of these agreements to ensure compliance with the Building Code 2016, or else the jobs of thousands of their members who work on Government projects will be threatened.
"From 1 September 2017, a business will only be able to express interest in, tender for, or be awarded Commonwealth funded building work if all enterprise agreements made after 25 April 2014 by the employer and its related entities comply with the Building Code 2016.
"Over 1,000 contractors and subcontractors have enterprise agreements that were made after 25 April 2014 which are not compliant with the Building Code 2016. These contractors and subcontractors are facing exclusion from Commonwealth funded building work from 1 September unless the agreements are varied. All parties need to pull out all stops to ensure that these agreements are varied without delay.
"Ai Group appreciates the support of the Crossbench Senators who voted in favour of retaining the Code, and protecting the community's interests," Willox said.