Category Archives: Construction industry

Anger as CFMEU ‘sweetheart deal’ suspended in Queensland government crackdown

Posted on by

Union members hit out at LNP as deputy premier announces pause on pay and conditions policy

A “sweetheart deal” for the CFMEU has been suspended in an unprecedented crackdown after the embattled union was blamed for major project cost blowouts.

Construction union “perks” were put on ice as the Queensland government stepped up a campaign to tackle the CFMEU, with some union members clearly not happy.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s breaking news email

Continue reading...

Tory former energy secretary facing conflict of interest claim over JCB owner links

Posted on by

Shadow cabinet secretary Claire Coutinho accepted donation from Lord Bamford while overseeing millions awarded to his family businesses in green grants

A Conservative former cabinet ­minister who took donations from the billionaire boss of the JCB digger dynasty – including a £7,000 trip on his VIP private helicopter – oversaw decisions to award his family’s business empire millions in taxpayer-funded green energy grants.

Claire Coutinho also posed for ­pictures promoting Lord Bamford’s personal £100m hydrogen engine project and accepted a £7,500 donation from JCB to her local election campaign while she was the energy secretary in Rishi Sunak’s government.

Continue reading...

Australian construction industry calls for skilled migration overhaul to ease ‘desperate’ shortage of tradies

Posted on by

Labour shortage is driving up construction costs and stopping industry from building enough homes to ease housing crisis, Master Builders says

Leading construction bodies are urging the government to change its approach to skilled migration and bring in more migrants to ease the shortage of tradies.

Industry bodies say a chronic shortage of workers across 12 different trades is impacting housing prices and affecting the flow of new homes into the market.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s breaking news email

Continue reading...

Developers to directly fund schools, parks and public transport under Victorian trial

Posted on by

Program that ties new infrastructure to housing projects will start in 2027 in 10 Melbourne ‘activity centres’, premier says

The Victorian premier, Jacinta Allan, says an overhaul of the state’s infrastructure contribution scheme will ensure communities that build more homes will receive funding for key amenities like schools and parks.

With her government’s third housing policy announcement in as many days, Allan on Tuesday flagged a revamped statewide pilot infrastructure contribution program.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s breaking news email

Continue reading...

Big business calls for $10bn housing reform fund to reward Australian states that streamline supply

Posted on by

Business Council of Australia also recommends phasing out stamp duty and fast-tracking migrant workers for building industry

The nation’s peak business body has called for a $10bn housing reform fund that will pay out to states that fix the regulation and planning bottlenecks contributing to the supply crisis.

The Business Council of Australia is also pushing for the nation-wide removal of stamp duty on homes, warning that it disincentivises people from moving to smaller dwellings and freeing up larger homes.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s breaking news email

Continue reading...

‘Planning passports’ that automatically approve high-quality new homes will be a game-changer, says Keir Starmer

Posted on by

Labour wants to see apartment blocks built in more densely populated cities to achieve its housing targets

A radical scheme to speed up the building of more apartment blocks in towns and cities – as opposed to individual houses and bungalows – has been announced by the prime minister on the eve of the Labour party conference.

Keir Starmer told the Observer in an exclusive interview that the new system of “planning passports” would be a “game-changer” as the government strives to build 1.5m new homes within five years.

Continue reading...

Tony Blair told to ‘take responsibility’ after Grenfell criticism

Posted on by

Campaigners call for apology after inquiry report makes several criticisms of decisions made during Blair’s tenure

Grenfell campaigners have called on Tony Blair to apologise and take responsibility for decisions made by his government that contributed to the fire that killed 72 people.

The former prime minister said on Thursday that tragedies such as the west London fire, which came after years of missed opportunities to regulate combustible cladding, were a result of unavoidable mistakes.

Continue reading...

Seven years after Grenfell disaster, thousands live in fear of cladding fire

Posted on by

As the final report on the fatal London blaze looms, many developers have not begun safety work

• Rowan Moore: The Grenfell inquiry is exposing a culture of contempt that has run deep in Britain

Grenfell was an avoidable tragedy, the inquiry’s counsel said on the final day of hearings. Yet with the report into the blaze that claimed 72 lives due this week, residents of other tower blocks fear that not enough has been done to prevent another catastrophe.

One of them is Gemma Lindfield. The 45-year-old barrister is still waiting for flammable cladding to be removed from her eight-storey apartment block in east London. It took three years before anyone even realised there was a problem. The following four years have been mired in indecision and wrangling about exactly who will pay to fix it.

Continue reading...

Removal of unsafe cladding from buildings ‘too slow’, says Angela Rayner

Posted on by

Deputy PM visited Dagenham, east London, after fire tore through block of flats undergoing remedial works

Angela Rayner has called efforts to remove unsafe cladding from thousands of at-risk buildings “too slow” and said it was her job to ensure remaining works finished as quickly as possible.

The deputy prime minister made the comments during a visit to Dagenham, east London, on Tuesday afternoon, the day after a dramatic fire tore through a block of flats that was undergoing remedial works to remove “non-compliant” cladding.

Continue reading...

Social housing rents to rise as part of UK push to build affordable homes

Posted on by

Rachel Reeves works on plan for 10-year formula to give councils and housing associations certainty

Social housing rents will rise by more than inflation over the next decade as part of UK government plans to boost affordable housebuilding and shore up the finances of struggling landlords.

The chancellor, Rachel Reeves, is working on plans to introduce a 10-year formula to calculate social rent on homes that will result in rents increasing every year by the rate of the consumer prices index – which is now 2.2% – plus 1%, removing an existing cap on rises.

Continue reading...

UK economy continues recovery from recession with GDP growth of 0.6%

Posted on by

ONS data shows strong performance in second quarter with service sector helping drive growth

Britain’s economy has extended its recovery from recession after recording growth of 0.6% in the three months to June, handing a boost to the chancellor, Rachel Reeves, in the run-up to the autumn budget.

Figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show gross domestic product continued to grow in the second quarter, after a rise of 0.7% in the first three months of 2024. The reading matched the forecasts of City economists.

Continue reading...

English councils to gain new powers to buy cheap green belt land

Posted on by

Landowners unwilling to sell would face compulsory purchase orders if site could host ‘quality housing scheme’

Councils and public bodies in England are to be handed powers to compulsorily buy cheap green belt land as part of the new Labour government’s drive to build 1.5m homes by 2030.

Green belt landowners who are unwilling to sell would face compulsory purchase orders (CPOs) that would force them to hand over their land if the site could host a “quality housing scheme” in the public interest.

Continue reading...

‘People think they’ll smell but they don’t’: building homes from mushroom waste and weeds

Posted on by

A sustainable project aims to repurpose encroacher bush to create building blocks to solve Namibia’s housing crisis

“People think the house would smell because the blocks are made of all-natural products, but it doesn’t smell,” says Kristine Haukongo. “Sometimes, there is a small touch of wood, but otherwise it’s completely odourless.”

Haukongo is the senior cultivator at the research group MycoHab and her job is pretty unusual. She grows oyster mushrooms on chopped-down invasive weeds before the waste is turned into large, solid brown slabs – mycoblocks – that will be used, it’s hoped, to build Namibian homes.

Continue reading...

Almost 40,000 homes across Australia waiting to be built as interest rates and building costs hit developers

Posted on by

KPMG analysis reveals 15,593 dwellings in NSW and 7,897 in Victoria are yet to break ground despite planning approval amid higher cost of materials and finance

Developers have yet to begin work on almost 40,000 new homes across Australia – including 11,170 in Sydney – despite being granted building approvals, with stubbornly high interest rates and construction costs being blamed.

According to KPMG analysis released on Tuesday, 15,593 dwellings with planning approval were yet to break ground across New South Wales by December 2023. It was only a slight improvement on the state’s figures a year earlier, when there were 15,818 approved dwellings across NSW where work was yet to commence.

Continue reading...

UK criticised over apparent call to firms to rebuild disputed areas of Azerbaijan

Posted on by

Officials held online meeting with business leaders despite flight of ethnic Armenians after military takeover of Nagorno-Karabakh

The UK government faces criticism after officials appeared to urge British businesses to help rebuild disputed areas of Azerbaijan just weeks after the state’s military takeover of Nagorno-Karabakh led more than 100,000 ethnic Armenians to flee the region.

Officials from the UK Foreign Office and the business department held an online meeting with British business leaders in November to encourage companies to take advantage of the “great opportunity” to support Azerbaijan president Ilham Aliyev’s rebuilding agenda.

Continue reading...

Penrith council closes park over concern mulch could contain asbestsos

Posted on by

Asbestos-like fragments found at newly-opened Regatta Park in Emu Plains sent for urgent testing, Penrith city council says

Penrith council has closed part of a park in western Sydney over fears it could contain asbestos-contaminated garden mulch from the same company that supplied the product used at Rozelle parklands.

Penrith city council says the newly opened Regatta Park at Emu Plains in the city’s west was partly closed after a review to determine if any mulch used by the council was provided by Greenlife Resource Recovery.

Sign up for a weekly email featuring our best reads

Continue reading...

UK housebuilder Crest Nicholson warns on profits, raising takeover speculation

Posted on by

Surrey-based construction company has been hit by rising costs and impact of high interest rates

One of Britain’s largest housebuilders, Crest Nicholson, has issued its third profit warning in a matter of months because of rising costs, raising speculation that it could become a takeover target unless its fortunes reverse.

The latest warning comes less than a week before the Surrey-based company will issue its full-year results, which are expected to lay bare the challenging year that housebuilders such as Crest Nicholson have faced amid surging interest rates, which have deterred buyers and caused house prices to fall.

Continue reading...

Explanation for asbestos in mulch at Sydney’s Rozelle parklands will ‘come out in due course’, supplier says

Posted on by

Exclusive: Greenlife Resource Recovery co-director says company is cooperating with environmental watchdog’s garden mulch investigation

The construction boss who runs the company that supplied garden mulch containing asbestos to Sydney’s Rozelle parklands says an explanation for the contamination will “come out in due course” as the environmental watchdog continues its investigation.

The Environment Protection Authority (EPA) was on Monday analysing samples from in and around Rozelle parklands after testing found bonded asbestos in 14 locations in mulch provided by Greenlife Resource Recovery.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup

Continue reading...

Unit owners in Sydney’s Mascot Towers offered chance to wipe debts years after defects found

Posted on by

Deal suggested by NSW building commissioner comes after residents were forced to evacuate in 2019

Owners of apartments in Sydney’s Mascot Towers may reach a potential settlement to clear massive debts for the first time since being forced to evacuate their units due to defects.

The New South Wales building commissioner, David Chandler, has offered a lifeline to residents of the buildings, in the city’s inner-south, who have been faced with significant repair bills since cracks were discovered in the basement in 2019.

Sign up for a weekly email featuring our best reads

Continue reading...

Australia will become the first country to ban engineered stone bench tops. Will others follow?

Posted on by

Ban is the culmination of a years-long campaign, driven by doctors, trade unions and workers involved in its cutting and handling

When an Australian worker developed a debilitating lung disease in 2015, it didn’t take researchers long to connect it to engineered stone bench tops – a popular feature in kitchens and bathrooms.

A years-long campaign, driven by doctors, trade unions and workers, was launched to ban the artificial material as silicosis cases rose among those involved in its cutting and handling.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup

Continue reading...