Latest News

‘Wave 5’ subcontractor on state of play

Geoff Helisma | Reflecting on Chris Gulaptis’s statement and speaking on behalf of the unpaid highway upgrade subcontractors, Jo Franklin said that some subcontractors “did attempt to exercise” the Securities of Payment Act (SOPA) legislation. One of the subcontractors claims that “the SOPA process takes too long and is too costly”. The subcontractor said that obtaining the required “payment schedules” was a non-event. “In all my time in this industry as a plant hire subcontractor we have never received payment schedules; head contractors state that it is too time consuming for them to provide these for every invoice they receive,” she said. “The time frame for claiming under SOPA is too long: if we are not paid on time and we choose to enact SOPA it takes at least a month … to achieve adjudication.” She said the “cost of adjudication is ridiculous”, pointing out the financial difficulty for a “struggling business … to fork out money to obtain a piece of paper to force their client to pay them”. Ms Franklin said she, too, was told by RMS manager Bob Higgins – in August last year – that the non payment “was a legal process [that] had to run its course without interference”. She disputed Mr Gulaptis’s claim that Mr Higgins had tried “to arrange work for any of the displaced workers”. “This did not happen for any subcontractor I have spoken to,” she said. “Melinda [Pavey, Minister for Roads] once claimed to the public that they were able to get 15 of the subbies ongoing work; Bob [Higgins] and Melinda did not assist us whatsoever, this work was achieved through the individual businesses’ tenacity to survive.” On Mr Gulaptis’s statement that he was ‘advised the NSW Government supports the recommendations of the Small Business Commissioner for any tax payments to the ATO to be waived in the interim period’, Ms Franklin said it was “deferred until the situation is resolved”. “Tax debt is in the area of $100,000 for each of the smaller businesses, I can’t image how much for the larger companies,” she said. “This amount of tax debt per entity, almost completely restricts borrowing capacity for business recovery and growth, and similarly restricts the capacity for a family to acquire a home loan. “This debt is a black cloud that hangs over businesses already suffering.” Meanwhile, the NSW Labor Party has launched a petition calling for “the citizens of New South Wales [to] respectfully express their concern for the twenty-three small businesses who have been so seriously impacted by the collapse of Ostwald Brothers”. The petition also calls for the implementation of “the outstanding recommendations of the Collins Inquiry [2012], which would have ensured these contractors were paid in the first place”. Information on the petition can be found here: www.nswlabor.org.au/support_our_subbies.