Well, we are “allowed” to kick back into gear as of Tuesday. BUT, and it is a big but, the compliance costs and rules are almost unworkable, made up by people in a committee who have never worked on a building site in their life (spoiler alert: I own a building company).
We are supposed to set up “washing stations” with soap and water and sanitiser at each site, clean every site down after each trade leaves each day. Then the washing stations have to be cleaned down each time they are used. The portaloo needs to be cleaned and sanitised by each person before and after use.
I have 20 sites under construction at present and a quick check reveals the suggested washing stations can be mine for $450 each. Plus GST. $9k minimum to get all my sites up and running if I can get the washing stations and stop them from being nicked. So I need to have a lockable container on each site, and someone has to take responsibility for the site every day, making sure the washing station is cleaned and put away. We can have more than one trade on site but they have to distance themselves, so we then need to look at having trades on site on different days. The recommended gap is three days, ’cause they think the virus dies after three days.
Now I am responsible and will follow the rules, but I know many of my competitors didn’t follow the rules and H&S procedures before the lockdown so they sure as hell aren’t going to follow them now. If someone on one of my sites has to get a test, that site and potentially all of them get shut down for up to 14 days while they do contact tracing.
I know I am fortunate to actually get back to work and I feel for those who still cannot, but FFS, this is bullshit.
Hard and early, hard and early.
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