Toughest Subbies In The World

23 March 2023

Australian subbies are tough bastards, no doubt the toughest in the world and will need to be even tougher over the next two years now that this spineless Qld Labor government has given builders continuity of leave to have unfettered access to money that belongs to subcontractors.

The Queensland Government has deserted 90,000 subcontracting companies yet again in favour of their builder mates in the MBA.

Growing up we have to contend with Great White Sharks, Salt water Crocodiles, Blue Ringed Octopus, Box Jellyfish, Funnel Web Spiders, Tiger Snakes, Eastern Brown, Inland Taipan, Yellow belly sea snakes, Geographer Cone Snails (Conus Geographus) and the most toxic of all creatures, Liquidating Builders (Liquidating Theftus Ofourfuckingmoney Phoenixious).

"Liquidating Theftus Ofourfuckingmoney Phoenixious" can strike without provocation or warning. It has an LD50 rating of 0.025 and contains neurotoxins that can kill Subbies within minutes and at best, paralyse their financial stability which affects their business for years to come.

The LD50 rating means lower volume injected has higher toxicity.

Unfortunately, they seem to migrate from Southern states in large numbers to the warmer climate and abundant and seemingly endless supply of subbie creditor fodder South East Queensland has to offer.

And if thats not bad enough, we also have to survive the beclowned MBA performing in conjunction with the Labor Government as their puppeteers.

They lobby the Government to not implement and to delay Project Trust Accounts (PTA's) designed by Les Williams to save subbies from financial destruction.

Subbies, here is your government and the MBA working for you:

Remaining phases for the project trust account framework have been extended by up to two years as follows: 

• Phase 3 (all eligible contracts of $3 million or more) – to 1 March 2025.
• Phase 4 (all eligible contracts of $1 million or more) – to 1 October 2025.
• Retention trusts will also apply throughout the contractual chain from this point.

If a builder liquidates in the next 2 years (there will be dozens of them), say goodbye to your retentions and the last month or two of claims.

We know that some builders simply cannot resist the temptation that free subbies money offers to them. They come back time after time for more fill-ups.

They subscribe to the Alan Bond theory of personal wealth by any means possible. Words attributed to Bond are "creditors are cheap money, they don't charge interest, banks do, you can stretch them out for another 6 months easy!"

Dishonest builders would say it slightly differently, "creditors are free money, just don't pay them, then there is no need for banks!".

We are also fully aware that there have been extenuating circumstances which in some builder failures, can be blamed on this weak, out of touch government unnecessarily locking our borders causing havoc to supply chains in the industry but as mumma the Premier sanctimoniously told us, "we did it to keep you safe".

Clearly they had no faith in adults keeping themselves and families safe. When I need that deceitful rabble of a government to keep me safe, I will give the game away.

We know builders who have made an art-form of liquidating then phoenixing, successfully doing it 2 and 3 times, always with impunity.

I was talking to an ex 1 percenter bikie last week who said he had done jail time for crimes he committed.

He cleaned his act up, left that scene behind, went legit into a successful construction industry business but then it was almost all taken away in a large builder liquidation in 2016.

He has worked his way back now but he said where he came from, you went to jail for your crimes but in the construction industry, the white collar crimes of liquidating away millions of other peoples money goes unpunished, despite evidence of fraud and falsification of financial records required by the QBCC and doctored legal documents such as stat decs.

QBCC is more about woke these days, industry experience is lacking at the top, ASIC does nothing, the Police won't act and the Qld Labor Government ably assist by not following through with PTA's as promised.

Yes, Aussies subbies are tough bastards, no doubt the toughest in the world, they have to be to survive with the odds stacked against them.

The Government promised to get PTA's done years ago. They made a start on projects over 10 million and Government projects over 1 million and now we are waiting with baited breath to see the outcome of that when the dust settles on PBS Building (Qld) Pty Ltd.

PBS were building 2 projects worth in excess of 10 million and because of that, they were working under Project Trust Accounts.

From the Courier Mail;

"It was also previously revealed the collapse of PBS was set to become the first major test of Queensland’s landmark construction industry reforms ensuring tradies get paid , as the company is the first to go under with state-sanctioned trust accounts in place".

Despite the Qld Government folding like a deck of cards on the full implementation of PTA's, we are waiting with great anticipation to see the outcome of the PBS Building Trust Accounts already implemented and the distribution of the funds to subbies and how long that takes.

Subbies have said that PBS were ok to deal with, they were not on our radar so the administration came pretty much out of the blue which makes us wonder what caused their administration almost without warning.

Project Trust Accounts used on their jobs means that subbies money should be safe including Retentions for the first time.

With PTA's in place, builders can no longer use subbies money and take it with them when they liquidate.

There is a statutory charge over retentions which makes subbies secured creditors.

Builders no longer have access to the trust accounts.

Master Builders and Master Plumbers, what use are these pretentious organisations?

Master meaning;

a man who has people working for him, especially servants or slaves."he acceded to his master's wishes". That is what this government did with PTA's.

Phased implementation was delayed but even then, it should all have been in place by 1st October 2023.

Now with the help of the industry organisations, the government has shown its lack of spine yet again and delayed the full implementation of PTA's for a further 2 years.

We know dozens of plumbers who have done millions of dollars in liquidations. I wonder how they feel about their organisations efforts here. I wonder were the rank and file members asked for their opinion.

All subbies should relinquish their MPA and MBA memberships in protest at the lobbying of this government to continually delay PTA's.

MBA are the enemy of subbies so why any subbie would be a member of that builder centric organisation is beyond me.

As you can see, Aussie subbies have to be tough just to reach adulthood and even tougher to survive in the construction industry and after many promises, an almost total lack of government support and with all sorts of deadly creatures snapping away at our heels.

Subbies add a level of protection to your business and join SubbiesUnited and make use of our private members forum for up to date information but a warning, if you are NOT a subcontractor, DO NOT JOIN, we will weed you out, you are not welcome.