Greedy builders the real culprits – not the hard worker on site
Mr Costello wants BATU “brought into line”. Pity, then, that he can’t get his facts straight .
Output in housebuilding, in which most of BATU’s 9,000 members are employed, has been remarkable over the past six years. That record has been achieved by an advance towards full employment among building workers and by major increases in their productivity. How else could the number of new houses finished per annum have increased from 39,000 in 1997 to 52,600 last year?
In 2000, hourly earnings in the construction sector rose by an average 13% over 1999, with increases for unskilled workers rising more rapidly than those for skilled workers.
In 2001, according to Department of Finance figures, the overall increase in wages in the sector was 8.7%, and again increases for unskilled workers were higher than for skilled workers such as bricklayers and carpenters who recorded an average of about 7%.
Such increases for BATU members compare with wage increases throughout the services sector averaging 8.3%, 10.9% in the financial services and 10.4% in the public service in 2001.
The 45% inflation in tender prices by the building and construction industry, as quoted by Mr Costello, bears no relationship to labour costs for the obvious reason that wage increases for BATU members during the building boom have been offset by very significant increases in productivity.
Neither industrial relations nor labour costs have ever been advanced as a significant constraint on building activity by any economic commentators, government or industry, until Mr Costello came along.
He predicts a downturn in building activity over the next two years. It is a fact that in the event of a slowdown in the economy, building workers are the first to be laid off. So, we come to the real reason for Mr Costello’s ire. He is in a rush to find a scapegoat now among the unionised workforce in the building industry for the plight that is about to befall the sector on foot of its own greed. It wasn’t BATU members, or any other building workers, that inflated tender prices for construction projects to a level described as “unsustainable” by the then Minister for Environment two years ago.
Nor have building workers driven new house prices to such a pitch that most young couples must barter their souls, and practically their grandchildren’s, to get a mortgage sufficient to buy a modest home.
In his search for someone to blame for the uncertainties that hang over his industry, Mr Costello might do better to look closer to home instead of wagging his finger at building workers.
Paddy O'Shaughnessy,
General Secretary
Building and Allied Trades Union.
