Cream rises to the top in the Centre
AM referring to the Civil Contractors Federation 2007 National Conference held in Alice Springs recently. What a glittering evening it was – the “Oscars of the Civil Construction Industry”. An evening filled with anticipation as the various envelopes were opened. (For details on the winners and grinners see pages 1 and 7 of this issue.)
Having been involved in the award’s inception in 1994 and a national judge for six years thereafter, it was very satisfying to see the profile and prestige of the awards continuing to increase. The national judges, retired consulting engineers Ken Chiller and Frank Bishop and retired contractor Geoff Brown, told me that this year was particularly difficult to judge. Such was the breadth and quality of finalists.
I was “lured” (it didn’t take much) to the conference to speak in a Friday afternoon forum. I found out at the Federation’s Annual General Meeting that the main reason I was there was for a presentation of Honorary Membership of the Federation for services rendered in a previous life as National Executive Director.
I was deeply honoured and extremely appreciative. However, back at the aforementioned forum when asked to nominate one of the major issues of the day by facilitator George Negus, I suggested that the long and continuing construction boom – occasioned by a resources boom which has highlighted in a cruel way the lack of vision of present and previous governments to address our shortage of infrastructure – may lead us into a false sense of construction security.
Of course it’s wonderful – but as I suggested it’s easy to think that as the boom continues, today’s order book is the norm. Some who have been around for a long time can remember high interest rates and yards full of gear.
I read at the weekend that the NSW Government is going to spend a staggering $34 million a day on infrastructure. And there will be more dollars as we get closer to the election. I also read an opinion on why the federal government is not enjoying as much support from Generation Y youngsters – they have never known anything but a buoyant economy and are perhaps seeing the government as tired, unfashionable and out of touch.
Similarly, many of our young engineers and construction workers have only seen the industry in boom times. I also read recently that there is a severe shortage of graduate engineers. But I can remember graduate engineers accepting jobs as construction workers – down in the trenches to get a start in the industry. The early 90s were tougher times. May the good times continue to roll.
Another issue to emerge during the conference was the frustration still being experienced by contractors in finding good staff, encouraging school leavers to join the industry and providing them with training and skill development. Other issues included the incredibly high cost of regulatory compliance and how smaller and mid tier contractors can compete with the major contractors – a very large component of which is now rolled into the one overseas owned camp.
When I left CCF in 2002 some private companies were starting to get into joint ventures. Speaking with old contracting friends, the size of private contractors has grown significantly and JVs are happening for projects well in excess of $200 million.
It is not many years ago that not only would a project that size be regarded as very big but would only be undertaken by the major national companies. I guess this growth trend only reflects the capability and innovation that the private companies have always had and the sheer volume of work has created the opportunity to rapidly increase capacity and size – in many cases doubling and trebling!
As one well known contractor said in the Friday forum “just give me one more boom – I won’t waste this one”. From my observations a lot of other contractors are not wasting this one either.
Doug Huett was National Executive Director of the Civil Contractors Federation from 1988-2002. He is now an industry commentator.
Source: Construction Contractor
7-Dec-2007