Building Stronger Foundations · 2019-08-19 · 2 INTRODUCTION The Master Plumbers and Mechanical Contractors Association of NSW (MPA NSW) is a registered employer organisation providing

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Building Stronger Foundations

Submission by:- Master Plumbers Association of NSW on 25 July 2019

Contact Details:

Mr Paul Naylor – Chief Executive Officer Master Plumbers Association of NSW PO Box 42, Lidcombe, NSW, 2144

W www.masterplumbers.com.au

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INTRODUCTION The Master Plumbers and Mechanical Contractors Association of NSW (MPA NSW) is a registered employer organisation providing representation, training and extensive advisory services to a broad base of members in the plumbing, gas and mechanical services sector in NSW and the ACT. The principal activities of the Association are to provide business services, industry representation, training and advice on industrial relations and employment to the membership. Our members range from major contracting companies through to sole traders and are a highly reputable group to lobby government in support of various plumbing, business and environmental reforms and recommendations.

COMMENTS

The Association wishes to thank the Minister for the invitation to participate in the consultation process in respect of the “Building Stronger Foundations” Discussion Paper. In the Ministers introduction to the Discussion Paper, the statement that “The paper delivers on the NSW Government’s commitment to consult with industry and community stakeholders on the introduction of the reforms” and further “ït will be important to work in partnership with industry and the NSW community to get the balance right”, some might say that we have heard this before, but nothing changes. The Association sees Minister Anderson as a breath of fresh air that may just be the person to open the doors to a real consultation process that listens to the voice of industry and implements changes that will continue in the future, rather than fall back to the closed-door process of consultation that prevails at present. NCC 2019 To example the above statement, ‘Attachment A’ is correspondence between the Association and Minister Anthony Roberts, Minister for Planning, before this years election regarding changes to the Building Code of Australia (BCA) and the National Construction Code 2019 (Part B4 Fire-Fighting Water Services). The correspondence is self-explanatory on the Association’s concerns and the response from the Minister on 28 February 2019 indicates that these concerns are currently under consultation and that the “Department of Finance, Services and Innovation has indicated that it will convene a forum”. The outcome:

• No consultation with the Association;

• Contact with Fair Trading and Department of Planning - no action;

• Five (5) months later still no action – the door has been closed!

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Plumbing Inspection Bookings A further example of the growing practice of no consultation, but operational change by bureaucratic direction can be found on the News Flush Alert sent out on 28 May 2019. The Association has been provided with a log of calls made by a cottage construction plumber to the Plumbing Inspection Booking line to book inspections of work in progress on completed work, under the audit inspection system. The report lists calls made to the Bookings line from 1 November 2017 to 17 July 2019 by the contractor’s office staff and are listed by Date, On Hold, Speaking, Name , Bookings and Total Time. The log demonstrates the loss of productivity for the contractor’s office staff in waiting on the phone to arrange bookings. The cost of the lack of productivity in the long run is passed onto the consumer through the builder. The time changes as implemented by Fair Trading may be beneficial to the staff of Fair Trading, but is detrimental to the productivity of the contractors who need to engage in the process of booking inspections. Plumbing inspections now come under the control of the Department of Customer Service, but there is no customer service in the change to the recent decision on changing booking time arrangements. Again, it examples the growing lack of consultation in such important changes to industry regulation and it will not be acceptable to be told it was a managerial decision and was advised by email alert. The original booking time arrangements went through an extensive consultation process with the Association and individual contractors and to now have the process overturned by a bureaucratic decision without consultation, flies in the face of what the Minister has indicated in the preamble to the “Building Stronger Foundation” Discussion Paper.

Licensing At the consultation session, the Association raised the long standing problem of the failure of Fair Trading to provide any rationale for why the applicant for a Plumbing Contractors Licence is not required to demonstrate any knowledge of how to operate a business , cost work or understand WHS from the perspective of a contractor. The course that is required to gain a Plumbing Contractors’ licence is the Certificate IV in Plumbing and Services (Operations). The extract from the

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Fair Trading website is ‘Attachment C’. The full course Certificate IV in Plumbing and Services (Operations Stream) is ‘Attachment D’. The position that the Association has advocated for many years is that the full course should be completed to gain a Contractor’s Licence. Fair Trading only requires the completion of the design/technical competencies and ignores the five (5) core competencies for the full qualification. Simply put it does not require the applicant to know how to run the business and look after the safety of the staff employed in the business. The Association has made numerous representations to past Fair Trading Ministers who have all basically said they do not understand the rationale, but have never changed the qualification to require the applicant to complete the full Certificate IV Plumbing and Services (Operations). Examples of the correspondences are: 27 March 2009 - Submission to the Office of Fair Trading Re –

Licensing. February 2010 - Consultation Paper – A re-write of the Home

Building Act 1989 12 December 2012 - IPART Review – Reforming Licensing in NSW –

Review of Licence rationale and design 15 April 2014 - NSW Fair Trading – RIS – Home Building

Regulation 2014 The Association provides these examples to demonstrate the longevity of the argument and the intransigency of Fair Trading to explain the rationale of why a Plumbing Contractor does not need any formal qualifications in the operation of a business. The Association can provide more examples of correspondence if the Minister so desires. DISCUSSION PAPER In general, the Association in considering the “Building Stronger Foundations” Discussion Paper wishes to identify three (3) issues that specifically relate to the plumbing industry. They are broadly defined in the NSW Government Response to the “Building Confidence” Report on Page 9 as dot points 2, 3 and 4. A vast amount of the report relates to the practices and qualifications of building professionals, which the Association believes is best left to the appropriate professional organisations to comment upon.