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Event: Interview with Gary Hardgrave, 4BC Brisbane Radio
Date: 23 September 2024, 4.30pm AEST
Speakers: Denita Wawn, CEO Master Builders Australia
Topics: Future of the Workforce Report, Labour shortages
E&OE
Gary Hardgrave, 4BC Radio Host: Well, I was talking about school dropouts and how we shouldn’t instantly write off kids who leave school early as rejects. I mean, I’m maybe overselling it, but when the Opposition said that we’re going to have new intervention programs for people who drop out of school because they’re on the pathway to criminality, my, the hair on the back of my neck really bristled. Because so many people who leave school go on and do things with their hands, tradies, for instance they’re very clever? They go on, well, they could buy and sell any of us. They have highly successful careers. Last hour Anne in Carindale had this to say.
Call-In Recording: Schools are not the right place for everyone. I was talking to a lady recently whose son had struggled in school, and she, at 14, she said she made the hardest decision, she allowed him to leave school and take on an apprenticeship. And she saw a child who had really struggled in school to blossom because he could do things with his hands, and she just said he just absolutely blossomed. And he’s gone on to save his money while he was in that apprenticeship, and he bought himself his own ute, and he’s now just finished his apprenticeship, and he loves what he’s doing.
Gary: Yeah, and then, of course, the other call, which was about, well, the text, was about $1.5 million house they bought and the investment properties they got in Sydney’s Northern Beaches. I mean, you just love it! I love it! Well, done Anne! I mean, I just say, get them into those nation building trades. We need them, and based on the current situation, we’re desperate for good, hard workers in the construction industry. So let me tell you, if you know somebody, a younger person, who’s struggling, let the Master Builders Association of Australia know. They’ve released some data today, brand new data today, suggesting we are, wait for it, 130,000 workers short in the building industry. Denita Wawn is the CEO of Master Builders, joins me now, Denita, this is a mess. It’s, a mate of mine who understands housing says, “getting mugged and getting a housing crisis is like getting mugged by tortoise”. It’s taken a long time to get to this point, but 130,000 workers short. How did we get here, Denita?
Denita Wawn, CEO Master Builders Australia: Well, Gary, it all comes back down to the 1980s I know when I was finishing school, at that time, everyone was told that the most appropriate course of action was to go to university, that trades was deemed a second class citizen, and we’ve really failed the country and an awful lot of students ever since then, with this push totally towards university and treating people who go and do a trade like a second class citizen. And we say enough is enough, you’ve absolutely nailed it earlier. There are so many successful tradies, and at the moment, the timing is perfect, because there is so much work on.
Gary: Yeah, everybody I know who left school early and we sort of laughed. Oh, what’s happened to Fred? Oh, he’s gone off to do some sort of a trade, some builders taken him on, ah, poor old Fred. Well, he was the one that arrived back with the flash car. And not only that, when he was 17, got his driver’s license with the flash car, he could afford to take his girlfriend out when he was 18, the rest of us were struggling. I mean, it’s just the reality of what, what I’ve learned over my slightly longer life than yours. I mean what sort of impact is this now having on our ability to deliver homes and critical infrastructure? That’s why the costs are going up, isn’t it?
Denita: That’s right. Unfortunately, a home at the moment, whether it’s a home or a unit, is costing us 40% more than what it was five years ago. And that is predominantly because we don’t have enough people. The way you look at cost of building, it’s all about how quickly you can do it to get that turnover of trades, remembering there are 40 trades required to complete a home, and if you’re not doing it one after the other, then the costs escalate. And if you’ve got a shortage, then a lot of those subcontractors can charge some good money. So, the consequence was seeing costs skyrocket, which means housing is no longer affordable in many circumstances, and we’re even seeing social and affordable housing nearly doubling the cost of building than what it was five years ago.
Gary: You know, Costco and America have decided they’re going to start allowing people to build houses above their Costcos. Could you imagine that? I mean, this is the, this is the sort of creative problems they’ve got there. There’s problems all over the world, and I don’t know what happened to the tradies. My wife said to me this over the weekend. Lorraine said, you know what happened? Covid came and suddenly all these people disappeared. Suddenly, we’ve lost all these people who were able to wait in in restaurants and coffee shops. We lost all these people out of our marketplace. But it seems it’s happened all around the world, Denita, and I think the building trades is, you know, just another victim of exactly that “whatever happened to them”, kind of problem.
Denita: Yeah, it is. And this is not an Australian specific problem. We know that we’re competing at the moment with Canada, UK and New Zealand, they all have a special tradie visa class. We don’t, and that not only makes it easier for people to go into those countries, but it also supports them through all that trade recognition of the qualification recognition, of licensing if it’s required, and also gap training if necessary. We don’t have that, you know, structured system in this in this country, and as a consequence we’re falling further and further behind as we’re competing internationally for a declining skill.
Gary: I’ve had a rip at the state minister, and I don’t expect you to be on the detail on the Queensland specific, but I had a rip a few times because a couple of years ago, in the midst of covid, he said, oh, you guys haven’t filled in your form, so 3000 tradies were booted out of the Queensland building industry. 3000! They got the message. They went and got other jobs equally. The other statistic I’ve heard mentioned at a forum I was at a few months ago, only 3% of people coming to Australia in our skilled migration program have building trade skills, so we can’t even import them. And I actually challenged the Prime Minister last week on air, saying, you need to now start searching the world for people with building trade skills. Trade up the difference, understand the occupational licensing, get the local rules in place. But if they can drive a nail or screw in a bulb, I want that person here right now.
Denita: Totally agree with you, Gary. And the other thing we’ve really got to be cognizant of is there are, I think, something like nearly a million people currently in the country under different visa classes that are underutilised. They are not working at their capacity in terms of their qualification. We need to support them. The government has given us some pilot money to support them through that gap training, but it is critical that we support those already in the country that made a decision to come here, but we are not supporting them. And I don’t know about you, but I’ve run into an awful lot of qualified electricians driving Ubers and taxis because it is costing too much money for them to get their qualifications. It’s about $10-15,000 and about 18 months, and a lot of them simply cannot afford it. So that’s a good place to start, and as well as focusing on more people coming internationally as well.
Gary: You know, it’s barking mad. We shouldn’t just take anyone. I get it, I understand. We want them to be working safe and all those things, right. But right now, we need people who understand the concepts, and if they’ve got a piece of paper, that’s not right, let’s get the piece of paper right. Surely, we can do this faster, Denita, and on top of that, how do we get more kids? And I, you know, I was once a federal training minister, so it’s not a, not a new question for me, but getting kids started in nation building skills. And ask, you know, saying to them, you want to do stuff with your hands, come and learn this. This is not second class. They are the first-class nation builders we need more of.
Denita: Oh, we absolutely do. We need to be encouraging more people, whether they are boys or girls, to get into a trade. It is phenomenal opportunities there. So, my youngest has just come back from his work experience in plumbing. I’m keen to hear how he went. And we need to be encouraging our kids to look at apprentices. Remember, when you do an apprenticeship, no HECS debt, you’re getting paid to be trained, and then you get qualified, and then you get a very handsome salary afterwards, and no HECS debt to repay. Pretty good outcome in comparison to those going to university. Don’t know about you, but I also think AI is going to take over the university qualified people more so than the trades as years go by.
Gary: Actually, I was at an AI seminar, I go to a few of these things. They’re pretty interesting. You pick up stuff. One of the comments made by a university lecturer from Sydney, I think, University of Western Sydney, thereabouts, he said, I think it’s going to be my job that’s going to be one of the first loss, because we’ll be able to create an avatar, a phony picture, and program the avatar to give the lecture. I won’t have a job, but the plumber will, the electrician will, the technician will, the person building the lecture hall will, I mean, I think that’s a really good telling point.
Denita: Absolutely, we’ve got so many opportunities. And certainly, we say it doesn’t matter whether you are 15, 17, 20, 30, or anywhere in between, or even 40, if you want to take up a trade, go for it. There are huge opportunities. There are a lot of apprentices out there, so it is worthwhile focusing on it. And certainly, the government, federal government, has currently got an apprentice incentive review. We understand it’s been completed. We’re waiting for the government to release it. We’re keen to see that because we need targeted programs focusing on things like construction industry, rather than just any course that people feel like doing.
Gary: As long as they’re not peer reviewed by teachers, it’ll be okay. No offense to teachers. I got plenty of them in my family, but we need people from business who need people now. They got the smarts. They know what they want. We don’t need it to be an academic study, in my view, but that’s just my view, Denita. Good to talk to you. Thank you so much for your time today. Denita Wawn, she’s Master Builders of Australia CEO.
Media contact:
Ben Conolly
Senior Advisor, Media & Public Affairs
0423 151 666
ben.conolly@masterbuilders.com.au