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Where’s Gillard’s ‘Tough Cop’ Now?

15 April 2010
By Brian Boyd, VTHC Secretary
The current national Building the Education Revolution (BER) scheme is worth $16.2 billion. It involves the rolling out 24,000 building projects at 9500 schools across the country. Many jobs have been both sustained and created in the important construction industry.

However, due to countless allegations that many building industry employers and major contractors have indulged in “profiteering”, “greed”, “rorting”, “double –dipping”,“rip-offs”, “shonky work”, “price gouging”, “mismanagement”, “wastage”, “overquoting, “cost –blowouts”, and “corruption”, the Federal IR and Education Minister Julia Gillard has had to set up (13/4) the B.E.R. Implementation Taskforce (BERIT). This $14 million funded body has the job of investigating these very serious claims.

But where is the Minister’s “tough cop on the beat” now? If less than half of these charges had been made against the building unions and their members the draconian ABCC, would have been called in immediately! Ten days earlier the Minister said she would “call on the police”, if her BER program was affected by inflated costs or corruption.

But now the BERIT is to ‘investigate’ and report back initially in 3 months. It may recommend criminal investigations, but it hasn’t got the power to compel witnesses to give evidence, like the ABCC. Minister Gillard has commented on the rorting claims, saying anyone in the building industry knows “it’s just not possible to do many projects and have them go perfectly”, adding it is “human nature” to try to exploit the situation with such “big, huge” projects!”

When Tony Abbott called for a judicial inquiry Master Builders Australia came out in support of the federal government’s school infrastructure program. Wonder why!

Can BERIT demand refunds from the big building companies if rorting and corruption is proved?

So called ‘consultant’ and ‘contingency’ fees have taken 20% of the $2.1 billion used so far in the QLD schools building program. The nation’s biggest construction companies like Baulderstone, Thiess, John Holland, Leighton’s, Abigroup, Laing O’Rourke, Hansen Yuncken and Watpac have been big fee takers. Many of these companies often co-operate with the ABCC against their own workforces. Minister Gillard has been lobbied hard by these companies to maintain the ABCC.

While the large builders were winning the overarching contracts, and charging big service fees, those down the line, that is on the tools, receive the basic remunerations.

On many sites the industry rates have been undermined by cash-in hand, tax dodging and the non-payment of superannuation and other well established entitlements.

The head of the BER Implementation Taskforce Brad Orgill has specialised in how big contractors “finance” construction projects. A conflict of interest?

In the 1990’s the NSW Giles Royal Commission exposed how “collusive tendering” between the top 10 big construction contractors undermined competitive tendering for many big projects in the 1980’s. A number of big employers were driven out of the industry for this illegal activity.

Now we have evidence that shows many of the federal governments BER projects didn’t even go out to tender at all!

The parallel $2.45 billion insulation program and the $5.2 billion social housing program are creating similar problems.

Clearly private sector companies are viewing these hastily rolled out initiatives as “financial honey pots”.

In contrast, if unions have a disagreement the “tough cops” (ABCC) are called in without hesitation. When workers recently were upset about accommodation arrangements on a major resources boom project in WA, Minister Gillard called in the ABCC. When teachers flagged that they have concerns about a government website, the Minister’s Fair Work Ombudsman (FWO) threatened big fines for individual teachers.

Here we have the employers facing extremely serious rorting charges and an inquiry is called.

The discrepancy in treatment is over the top.

To put the rorting in perspective we have seen the recent report (2/4) of two overseas students on 572 visas working for a tiling company for just over $3/ per hour. They were placed by a Melbourne based TAFE college with contractor D & K Tiling who never provided pay slips. The minimum award rate is around $200 per day and law firm Maurice Blackburn says the workers are owed $23,000 with the company in addition, facing heavy fines under the Fair Work Act. No sign of the Federal IR Minister commenting on this case.

The situation is becoming serious in an election year.