Last week Master Builders SA’s Policy and Technical Manager Andrew Cronin attended the annual face to face National Building Regulation Committee (NBRC) meeting in Sydney with counterparts from National Office and other MBA State and Territory offices around the country.
Guest presenters and facilitators included AMPLIFY who only 2 weeks prior, met with Peter Malinauskas, and our own CEO Will Frogley and other industry leaders at an industry summit in Adelaide around addressing the housing crisis using alterative building methods.
The facilitation at NBRC included AI-enhanced collating of participant responses to barriers and suggested approaches to overcome these for modular and other off-site construction.
Some of the obvious problems are that there is no consistent licensing regime and the way building contracts are structured and the finance behind those is very much based on “stick-built” construction. Other challenges are around product traceability and certification.
One key obstacle seems to be the high start-up costs for innovation with an uncertain pipeline of work to provide return on investment. Master Builders strongly believe Government at all levels need to play a role in driving this pipeline, particularly in regional, affordable and social housing. The recent announcement from the Premier around 120 homes using modern methods of construction (MMC) being constructed by 3 selected builders partnering with Renewal SA is a good example of what is needed.
Concerns around MMC were voiced from the NSW Acting Building Commissioner Matt Press about many companies using second hand machines and outdated technology to try to save costs on starting up. This is affecting quality together with the irregularity of inspection and servicing by engineers for machines, meaning that poorly constructed building components can reach sites en masse before an issue is detected in the production line.
None of the challenges are insurmountable but it will take a bold step, and critical investment. Striving for more housing more quickly at lower cost is something that the Premier of SA is very passionate about. There are likely to be further announcements around the next State election relating to this and it is something where Master Builders SA is front and centre of the debate and working closely with Government on how this is going to work in the current regulatory environment, skills and licensing.
