WYNDHAM subcontractors are among tradies struggling to find work as the state faces a shortage of infrastructure projects to keep them employed.
Many of the state’s major infrastructure projects are close to being completed, while local building projects have been hit by a construction company going into liquidation and claims of overseas workers being employed instead of western suburbs residents.
Out-of-work boilermakers are staging a protest against the use of migrant labour at Werribee’s Western Treatment Plant. A group of about 20 boilermakers picketing outside the sewage treatment centre since last Monday believe overseas workers are being employed to build a salt-reduction plant at the site.
Gippsland-based contractor Briagolong Engineering is working on the $40 million plant at the City West Water site to enable recycled sewage water to be used on gardens in the western suburbs.
Protesters say Briagolong is employing skilled migrant labourers on a temporary basis to build the plant.
The group’s spokesman Nick Donohue said there were boilermakers across the western suburbs who would have benefited from being employed.
“There is an abundance of skilled labourers around this area without work. The work has actually dried up.
“The government says there is a skilled labour shortage but there is actually a jobs shortage in Victoria.”
Mr Donohue said he had had no work since Christmas and worked only a couple of months last year.
“All eyes are on this project because there are no infrastructure projects on the horizon. There were no local advertisements for this work.”
The group wants City West Water to intervene and force Briagolong to use local workers.
A City West Water spokesman declined to comment, instead directing questions to the contractor.
In a statement, head contractor Tedra Australia described the protest as “racially oriented” and said it was costing contractors $300,000 a day.
It said the migrant workers were part of a permanent but mobile workforce that would be working at the treatment plant for another six weeks before moving on to another project.
The protest comes as a group of local subcontractors was left without work after the Nicol Group went into liquidation.
It was working on Wyndham Council’s Haines Drive sports pavilion and car park in Wyndham Vale, and a third kindergarten room at Featherbrook Community Centre, but was liquidated on December 20.
The move left about 10 subcontractors out of pocket after they were not paid for work they had done on the pavilion.
A spokesman for the subcontractors said the group met with the council last week and that discussions were continuing.
— With The Age
