Media Release
13 March 2009
Master Builders Australia Urges
Support for ABIP Bill
Statement by Wilhelm Harnisch, Chief Executive Officer
Master Builders Australia, the peak body for the building and construction industry, has called
for bipartisan support for the early passing of the Australian Business Investment Partnership
Limited Bill (ABIP).
Mr Wilhelm Harnisch, CEO of Master Builders Australia said “Construction finance has been
heavily choked even for AAA rated contractors/developers and has created a high level of
uncertainty and the proposed ABIP Bill should provide the necessary guarantees in place to
ensure that finance for major construction projects currently in progress are not an impediment.
“What is at risk is more than just commercial building projects remaining uncompleted. There
are serious downstream consequences.
“The potential collapse of financially sound large commercial projects under construction would
pose a number of risks. The risk is that commercial building asset values might fall precipitately
if current major projects under construction were to fail.
“This
would impact on the capacity of contractors/developers in securing finance for new
construction projects in due course and can only delay the economic recovery.
“It also has the potential to compound the negative returns to superannuation members. Major
commercial building projects are now an important asset class held by many of Australia’s
superannuation funds and self-managed superannuation funds”.
Master Builders agrees that ABIP should not be used to provide finance for those commercial
building projects under construction that are not financially sound but should only be used to
provide last resort finance where other sources of finance cannot be obtained.
Mr Harnisch said “Availability of finance and business confidence are the two critical factors that
need to be addressed in responding to the challenging economic period facing Australia”.
The proposed ABIP Bill therefore is an important circuit breaker in meeting those challenges.
Contact:
Wilhelm Harnisch, CEO Mobile: 0402 039 039
David Alexander, National Director Industry Policy Mobile: 0418 210 601
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