The Productivity Commission is currently undertaking five productivity inquiries seeking to strengthen the Australian economy.
The Reserve Bank of Australia has warned that falling productivity will lead to weaker growth and put a handbrake on living standards.
In a bid to improve productivity business groups have called for a 25 per cent reduction in regulatory red tape by 2030.
Business Council of Australia chief executive Bran Black said that reducing Australia’s red tape burden by one per cent could unlock an extra $1 billion across the economy annually.
In contrast, Weld Australia CEO, Geoff Crittenden, believes the problem isn’t too many rules and regulations, but too little.
Here Crittenden presents his case and explains why there is not enough compliance and why there is a need for greater enforcement.
More compliance
Australia’s problem is not too many rules. It is too little compliance and too little enforcement of the rules.
Let’s be honest about what’s in the firing line: the National Construction Code, building codes, and Australian Standards. These are not there to stifle growth or productivity.
They exist to protect people, property and the environment. Deregulation is not reform. It’s negligence.
If anyone thinks safety standards are ‘excessive’, ask the family of the worker who fell through a roof and never came home. Ask the parents of a young apprentice who died in a confined space.
Ask the owners staring at cracking walls in non-compliant apartments, or households whose homes burned to the ground because a cheap battery exploded. Ask the state governments forced to rebuild infrastructure at more than double the initial construction price because it wasn’t built to Australian Standards in the first place.
Removing regulations and standards boosts margins and profits for corner-cutters. It doesn’t build a safer, more productive nation; it builds risk.
Australia’s problem is not too many rules. It is too little compliance and too little enforcement. In construction particularly, too many players only worry about standards if they get caught.
Compliance and enforcement are chronically under-resourced. Against that reality, calls to ‘slash red tape’ are not only laughable, they reveal a complete misunderstanding of what is going on in this country.
If we want to go the American way—weak compliance, big profits for a few, and catastrophic failures for the rest—keep talking deregulation.
Talk of freezing the NCC or watering down Australian Standards is dangerously naïve.
The right response is enforcement: certify fabricators against recognised standards, inspect before steel is erected, and hold everyone to the same rules, including overseas suppliers. That’s how you lift quality, extend asset life and truly improve productivity.
Australia is already paying the price of weak compliance. Recent cases include a Brisbane rail footbridge installed despite 1,150 welding non-conformances; a major recreation centre roof collapse during construction; and a flood of low-quality imported heat-pump water heaters in the absence of a clear performance standard. These are not isolated incidents.
They are systemic red flags that shorten design life and push unplanned costs onto governments and communities.
Let’s start by enforcing a level playing field for all fabricated steel. Mandate and enforce that all fabricated steel erected in Australia complies with AS/NZS ISO 3834, whether fabricated locally or overseas.
Adopt a harmonised procurement framework that bakes in compliance.
Establish a National Fabrication Authority to certify Australian and overseas companies to the same standards and to inspect fabricated steel before installation.
Shift procurement and policy settings from lowest-price wins to asset life, maintenance burden and safety outcomes. That is how productivity genuinely improves.
Standards enable safe innovation, consistent quality and predictable markets. The choice is not growth or safety. It is growth through safety and compliance.
Australia needs courage and conviction to enforce regulations and local standards.