The collapse of the civil construction company Akron has demonstrated that the ACT Government needs to take a more active role in regulating companies contracted to perform Government work, Greens IR spokesperson Amanda Bresnan said today.

“We’ve seen questionable occupational health and safety and dodgy industrial relations practices on Government sites before, and the regrettable collapse of Akron leaves workers on Government sites out in the cold,” Ms Bresnan said today.

“We would expect that work carried out in the name of the Government, be it by Government employees or contractors, be conducted in the highest standards of integrity and diligence.

“Relying on the say-so of the contractors involved, as currently happens with the requirement for a statutory declaration saying a company has paid its contractors, can bankrupt small businesses and send workers home without jobs if it turns out the contractor hasn’t been paying its bills.

“Even where the Government contracts out, we would expect the Government to take an active role in enforcing standards, be it enforcing prompt payment of the subcontractors on site, or making sure OHS standards are met.

“We hope to see the Government take steps to ensure that subcontractors and workers affected by the collapse of Akron are promptly paid. It would be unfortunate if a subcontractor working hard to deliver Government contracts goes bust due to this unfortunate situation,” Ms Bresnan said

Tags: industrial relations, safety

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 2nd, 2010 at 11:40 am and is filed under Amanda Bresnan, News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.