Worker shortage, material costs threaten pipeline of work
Billions of dollars in infrastructure projects could be under threat because there aren't enough workers and construction materials.
Transcript
00:00 There's a lot of work to do. We've got to build, it's a growing country, we've got to
00:05 build about 1.2 million homes to reach our targets. We're upscaling in renewable energy,
00:11 we're expecting to see a real upsurge in that. Roads, rail projects need to get built and
00:16 defence infrastructure. To get all of this done, we're going to need, as you said, another
00:22 220,000 workers and we simply don't have them in the country at the moment. And the migration
00:29 reform that we've been talking about this week, Infrastructure Australia is saying that
00:33 won't be enough. We've also got the issue of materials. Adam Copp, who's the head of
00:38 Infrastructure Australia says we've got a whole raft of really complex problems.
00:44 It's an enormous amount of work building on what has been a boom in infrastructure over
00:47 the last 10 years. And unfortunately, we don't have the materials or the workers to deliver
00:52 on it all. So governments need to really focus on boosting supply. There's a long, strong
00:57 pipeline of work that needs to occur in Australia across a range of infrastructure sectors,
01:02 and we should really boost our homegrown and domestic talent.
01:06 So Gavin, which parts of the country are feeling these shortages the most?
01:11 Most acutely, we're seeing the major cities where a lot of the growth is happening and
01:15 we're seeing multi-billion dollar road and other infrastructure projects happening and
01:19 we just don't have the materials or the workers. But we're also seeing some particular regions
01:24 where this is being felt really acutely. Places like southern New South Wales, the mid-north
01:29 coast of New South Wales, as well as central Queensland and the Northern Territory. Some
01:34 of those more northern regions are interesting because there's a lot of major infrastructure
01:39 projects such as solar plants, big wind energy projects, as well as road. They just don't
01:46 have this kind of staff to get there and they don't have the materials. We're seeing things
01:52 like steel. We don't have the steel that's needed. Even though we do produce steel in
01:57 this country, it's not nearly enough to meet that demand and we're importing and that's
02:01 coming at a higher cost. And the skills we need, it's a real mix of the people they need
02:07 in some of those regions have to be skilled engineers, but also simply labourers as well,
02:12 people who can get this job done. So it's being felt all across the country, but particularly
02:17 acute in some areas.
02:19 And what are the recommendations stemming from this report?
02:22 It's a very complex issue and it's not going to get solved overnight. We're talking about
02:26 at the height of the pandemic, supply shortages and labour shortages. That's really still
02:32 lingering right now. And while there are calls, this Infrastructure Australia report calls
02:38 for a greater focus on bringing some of those higher skilled workers from overseas. They
02:44 talk about building up productivity and capacity from within as well. And also getting a bit
02:50 innovative about how we use materials. So recycling products, so we can actually make
02:55 roads and other types of infrastructure projects using materials we already have, because there
03:01 is obviously a lot of wastage in construction as well. But the industry is really thinking
03:05 about how it can retool in that way, but also a real focus on science, technology, engineering
03:11 and mathematics education, really building up that workforce from within Australia and
03:17 also retaining that workforce as well. Because of course, this is a global market, we're
03:22 competing for people not only overseas, but some of our best talent here are getting drawn
03:27 overseas as well.
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