Tag Archive for: covid

Construction Industry Lockdown: Stage 4 Restrictions for Metro Melbourne

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The second wave of COVID-19 has continued to spiral in Melbourne in recent weeks, causing the implementation of Stage 4 Restrictions in Metropolitan Melbourne. The Stage 4 Restrictions will be in force from 6:00PM on Sunday, 2 August 2020 for a period of 6 weeks until Sunday 13 September 2020.

Described by Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews as the ‘lifeblood’ of the Victorian economy, the building and construction industry has largely avoided previous restrictions. However, the Stage 4 Restrictions sees authorities issuing a specific directive to the industry to significantly reduce their operations.

We have compiled some relevant information detailing how the restrictions apply to the building and construction industry below.

Who is caught by the Stage 4 Restrictions?

The Stage 4 restrictions will apply to building and construction industry participants operating on construction projects located within the 31 local government areas that make up Metropolitan Melbourne.

For all businesses operating in these areas, the standard order is that any employee who can work from home is required to do so. This would likely apply to any employee who is providing an administrative or supportive function that can be performed remotely.

Building and construction industry workplaces, whilst permitted to continue operations, are deemed high risk, and are required to design and implement COVID-19 Safety Plans to ensure the prevention and management of COVID-19 transmission.

The level of restrictions that apply to a business will depend on the size of the project it is working on. Projects have been classified as either Small Scale, Large Scale or State and State Civil as follows:

  • Large Scale Construction: defined as any building or construction project of more than 3 storeys (excluding a basement level) and would typically include projects such as high rise apartment buildings or factories;
  • Small Scale Construction: defined as any building or construction project of 3 storeys or less (excluding basement level) and would typically include residential or domestic home building projects; and
  • State and State Civil Construction: defined as any large infrastructure project funded by the state, typically including projects such as trainlines, roads, schools and hospitals.

What are the Restrictions

Large Scale Projects

Businesses who are working on a large scale project are required to limit their operations on the project site to a maximum of 25% of the employees that would normally be on site, and to implement a High Risk COVID-Safe Plan.

Small Scale

Businesses operating on a small scale project are to limit the number of employees on site at any one time, inclusive of supervisors. Small scale projects also require employers to implement a COVID-Safe Plan.

State and State Civil

Whilst businesses who are currently working on state and state civil projects are exempt from the strict limitations above, they are required to implement a High-Risk COVID Safe Plan on their sites.

Employers who are operating on either large or small scale projects are required to be able to demonstrate that they are complying with the above limits, without blending shifts.

In addition, workers who would typically work across multiple worksites are permitted to work at just one worksite during the Stage 4 Restriction period.

Who is enforcing the lockdown and how?

Ultimately, the onus of ensuring compliance with the new restrictions, as well as the implementation of an appropriate COVID-Safe Plan will fall on the employer.

The Victorian Department of Health and Human Services has advised that it will work together with industry bodies, WorkSafe and Victoria Police to undertake the necessary enforcement and compliance activities.

The Department of Health and Human Services will also work together with WorkSafe to co-ordinate intelligence on potentially non-compliant businesses.

Businesses found to be non-compliant with their obligations under the Stage 4 Restrictions can be issued on the spot fines of up to $9,913, for:

  • refusing or failing to comply with the emergency directions;
  • refusing or failing to comply with a public health risk power direction; and
  • refusing or failing to comply with the Public Health Directions to provide information.

It is also possible for a business to be fined up to $100,000 through the courts for non-compliance.

Is there any assistance if my business is suffering?

The Victorian Government has announced an extension of its Business Support Fund scheme, offering grants to eligible businesses. Eligible businesses may be able to apply for a one-off grant of:

  • $10,000 if in Metro Melbourne and Mitchell Shire; or
  • $5,000 if in regional Victoria except Mitchell Shire.

Conclusion

The unprecedented stage 4 restrictions, whilst only applying to Metropolitan Melbourne, will likely see a significant slowdown of the building and construction industry in Victoria. Flow on effects are likely to be felt by suppliers, sub-contractors and services to the building and construction industry.

We previously published a short list of issuesshort list off issues to be mindful of when drafting and administering contracts during COVID-19. It is crucial for Victorian building industry participants to review their relief entitlements.

This article is based on current government recommendations and advice current as at the date of writing. It is intended to provide information and assistance to members of the building and construction industry who are affected by the Stage 4 Restrictions in Melbourne only. The above discussion is not intended to be legal advice, and readers should bear in mind that every case is different.

If you or someone you know wants more information or needs help or advice, please contact us on 02 9030 7400 or email info@bradburylegal.com.au.

Case article – Brolton Group Pty Ltd v Hanson Construction Materials Pty Ltd

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In Brolton Group Pty Ltd v Hanson Construction Materials Pty Ltd [2020] NSWCA 63 (Brolton), the NSW Court of Appeal considered the jurisdictional and procedural fairness grounds of an adjudicator’s determination.

Background

Brolton was contracted by Hanson to build a quarry processing plant at Bass Point. The parties agreed on a guaranteed maximum price of $85 million (excluding GST) in which Brolton was entitled to claim monthly progress payments on the last Tuesday of each month. Hanson claimed liquidated damages and the contract was eventually terminated on 3 October 2018. In August 2019, Brolton served a payment claim on Hanson. The payment claim claimed work up to September 2018 as well as interest on unpaid amounts to August 2019. The adjudicator determined in favour of Brolton, issuing an adjudication amount of $2,877,052.75. Hanson challenged the decision in the Supreme Court, with the Supreme Court finding in favour of Hanson. This resulted in the appeal by Brolton to the NSW Court of Appeal.

The Court’s decision

Brolton raised two main grounds of appeal. The first and most pertinent issue, concerning jurisdiction, centred predominantly on the availability of a reference date on which Brolton could make its payment claim.
Importance of jurisdiction and the trouble of jurisdictional error
Under the Building and Construction Industry Security of Payment Act 1999 (NSW) (SOP Act) section 22, an adjudicator is given the statutory authority to determine the amount of a progress payment, the date on which such amount became payable and the rate of interest payable on any such amount. The importance of section 22 is that it sets out the jurisdiction of an adjudicator. As the saying goes, with great power comes great responsibility. While the adjudicator is given the power to make these determinations, section 22 sets out the limited factors that the adjudicator can consider. These are the responsibility components of the adjudicator’s determination. Two of the relevant factors to consider in Brolton was the provisions of the SOP Act and the payment claim.
While adjudicators are given the power to make determinations, they can only do so in certain circumstances or if there are specified preconditions. In the legal world, this is called a ‘jurisdictional fact’. As Gleeson JA described in Brolton (at paragraph 28), the term jurisdictional fact is used to describe ‘any precondition which a statute requires to exist in order for the decision-maker to embark on the decision-making process’. Jurisdictional facts fall into two types:

1. The existence of an identified state of affairs; or
2. A state of satisfaction of the decision-maker as to an identified state of affairs.

A jurisdictional fact gives a decision-maker the power to make the decision. If it exists, then an adjudicator can make a determination. In this way, the reference date activates the adjudicators powers to make a determination under the SOP Act.
Under the SOP Act, a claimant is only able to make a payment claim when there is a reference date under the construction contract. Therefore, the existence of a reference date is a jurisdictional fact that falls into the first category. This is because the existence or non-existence of a reference date is objective and does not depend on whether the adjudicator is satisfied that a reference date exists. Where an adjudicator exercises its power, but the jurisdictional fact does not actually exist, the adjudicator has made a jurisdictional error..
Getting back to the case, in submitting its payment claim, Brolton claimed in its adjudication submissions that the reference dates for August 2018 and September 2018 were available for the payment claim. Hanson also contended that the September 2018 reference date was available for the progress payment. However, the adjudicator ‘went rogue’ and determined that the reference date was in fact 23 October 2018. There were a few issues with this. Firstly, the 23 October 2018 was not the last Tuesday of the month (which in fact was 30 October 2018). Secondly, the contract had been terminated on 3 October 2018, meaning no further reference dates arose. As the clause entitling Brolton to a progress payment did not continue beyond the termination of the contract, the adjudicator had made a jurisdictional error. The reference date the adjudicator relied on did not exist, and therefore the determination was void and the $2.8 million decision was overturned (as if it had never been made).

Although Hanson succeeded on the first issue, the Court was still minded to consider the second issue on appeal. The second issue concerned the procedural fairness of the adjudicator’s decision. Like jurisdiction, procedural fairness is a legal term that has important consequences for adjudication determinations. Procedural fairness is an aspect of natural justice, a foundational legal principal that sets the standards of how people are to exercise their authority. The concept of procedural fairness means the process in which a decision is made should be just. Procedural fairness requires that parties have the right or opportunity to have their case heard by the decision-maker. If there is a substantial denial of natural justice, the decision-maker’s determination will be void. In this case, the issue of procedural fairness arose because the adjudicator determined that the relevant reference date was a date not submitted by either party. Brolton argued that while procedural fairness was denied to the parties, it was immaterial and should not void the adjudicator’s decision. The Court found that the findings by the adjudicator were a material breach of procedural fairness and therefore there was a breach of natural justice.

Take-away points

While this article has discussed a few technical legal concepts, the main take away points from Brolton are that:
• A progress payment must be linked to a specific reference date. If an adjudicator incorrectly attributes a payment claim to a reference date which does not exist, the determination will be void.
• It is not enough that another reference date is available for the payment claim to be linked to. If the adjudicator goes rogue and determines a reference date not submitted by the parties, the decision will be void.
• Claimants should identify and make it abundantly clear the relevant reference date to which a payment claim relates and make submissions in the adjudication application as to what the relevant reference date is.
• Reference dates are essential for an adjudicator to make a determination. A failure by the adjudicator to appropriately determine a reference date can have dire consequences to claimants.
• Note: The recent amendments to the NSW SOP Act have eliminated the post-termination payment claim issue. Section 13(1C) now states that for construction contracts that have been terminated, a payment claim may be served on and from the date of termination. This change will only apply to contracts entered into after 21 October 2019.

COVID Update – Environmental Planning and Assessment (COVID-19 Development – Construction Work Days) Order 2020

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Yesterday (April 2,2020), the Environment Planning and Assessment (COVID-19 Development – Construction Work Days) Order 2020 came into effect. The Order allows for building work and demolition work to be carried out on Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays, provided that the development is approved through development consent and continues to comply with all other conditions of the development consent. Further any work that is performed on a Saturday, Sunday or public holiday must:

  1. comply with the conditions of consent that restrict hours of work on any other day as if the condition applied to work on a Saturday, Sunday or public holiday;

 

  1. not involve the carrying out of rock breaking, rock hammering, sheet piling or similar activities during the weekend and public holiday work hours; and

 

  1. all feasible and reasonable measures are taken to minimise noise.

 

So what does this mean for the construction industry? Where a project is subject to development consent conditions that restrict the days of working to Monday to Friday, the Order allows for the approved working hours in the development consent to apply to weekends and public holidays. The purpose of this Order is to allow for construction sites to implement social distancing measures which may require smaller workforces on site but prevent or minimise loss of productivity by allowing works to be carried out on more days.

As a result, construction programs may need to be reconfigured to balance the slower rate of progressing the works due to social distancing and/or team splitting, any EOTs claimed and the greater number of days that can be worked.

The Order may also result in contractors and subcontractors being able to make a claim in relation to a change in legislative requirements under their contracts. This may result in entitlements for time or cost relief arising from complying with the Order and other government orders made in response to the COVID-19 outbreak.

If you need advice as to how this order affects your contractual obligations or are negotiating a contract, please contact us. We are committed to providing the highest quality of legal services at competitive prices to help you and your business get through these challenging times.

Coronavirus (COVID-19) and Construction Contracts: What are your options?

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Coronavirus (COVID19) and the construction industry: What are your options?

We recently published an article about how construction contracts can incorporate concepts of force majeure events. A copy of our article can be found here.

As the disruptions of corona virus begin to become more extensive with government mandates coming into effect, we believe it’s important for those in the construction industry to have a quick reference guide as to their options or important things to think about.

 

Pre-contract: Tendering, negotiating and drafting of contract
Force Majeure clause ·         Manages the relationship between the parties where there has been an ‘Act of God’ or other similar severely disrupting event

·         Depends on the contractual definition of the term

·         Generally, suspends the obligations until the force majeure event has concludes

·         Important to consider when the parties’ obligations will resume – what will indicate the end of the force majeure event
Scope of Works and mitigation of supply chain risk ·         Where possible, alternative supply or materials should be specified in the scope of works with pre-agreed variation prices
Extensions of Time ·         Can include force majeure event as a qualifying cause of delay

·         What circumstances can the contractor or subcontractor seek an EOT?

·         Generally appropriate for an EOT to be granted where there is suspension of works, variation, act, omission or breach of the other party, force majeure events and/or industrial action occurring across the relevant state or territory

·         Are there any duties to mitigate the delay which are a precondition to receiving an EOT
Delay Costs and/or damages ·         Does the contract provide for any delay costs or damages?

·         What are the circumstances that the contractor or subcontractor is entitled to costs and are there any relevant caps?
Legislative Provisions ·         How are the change in legislative requirement provisions worded?

·         Consider the definition of legislative requirement (and/or equivalent and related definitions)

·         Consider whether legislative provisions should include a carve out for where there is a change in the legislative requirements in relation to COVID19. Given the uncertainty around how the government will proceed, it is difficult to predict how the legislative regimes or executive orders will change as the response to COVID changes and adapts
Labour and Key Personnel ·         Are there any key personnel of the contractor or the subcontractor that should be specifically identified?

·         Are there specific measures the Principal/Contractor want to specifically implement? Examples may include split teams
Security ·         Consider what types of security will protect against insolvency risk of contractors or subcontractors – Parent guarantee, retention monies, material security and/or bank guarantees

·         Consider circumstances where there may be recourse to the security such as where a party becomes insolvent or there are defective works that require rectification

·         Consider Principal security for payment if there are any solvency concerns
Insurance ·         Principals should consider whether there are suitable insurance policies to protect from any delays to the works or any consequences that the delays may have at the end of the project

·         For example, Principals may wish to discuss delay in start-up insurance with their insurance broker
Warranty deeds and defects ·         Principals may wish to require warranty deeds from the subcontractors to insure against any insolvency risk from contractors and to allow for any defects to be rectified independent of the contractor
Financial capacity of the tenders ·         When assessing potential contractors, Principals should consider the financial capacity of contractors and whether there are any solvency concerns and if there are any parent companies that can provide guarantees
Project deadlines ·         What deadlines are imposed by related contracts such as sale of land for off the plan properties

·         How long are the deadlines and timeframes of the project? Can they be extended to account for coronavirus
Contract structures ·         Profit/cost-saving sharing models of contract or guaranteed maximum price may be considered by Principals to minimise cost exposure of contracts that may be affected by coronavirus (such as supply chain risk)
Contract administration
Extension of time ·         Principals and Superintendents generally have the power to issue an EOT even when a claim may not be made by the Contractor. While they are not obliged to use this power for the benefit of the contractor, there may be practical and goodwill benefits in using these powers

·         Contractors should seek legal advice in terms of the relevant EOT clause and whether they have a right to seek an EOT or what other options are available to them under the contract
Suspension ·         Suspension is generally a grounds for an EOT

·         Consider who bears the cost of suspension under the contract

·         Is there a right for the contractor to claim any suspension costs or costs associated
Change to legislative requirements ·         In the event of government mandated shutdown, there is likely going to be claims for legislative changes. These will largely depend on the wording of the clauses, who bears the risk on legislative changes and the form of the government shut down

·         Other considerations include whether construction work is considered an essential service and to what extent
Variations ·         Where there is a supply chain breakdown due to closed borders, there may be claims for variations being made by Principals or Contractors to allow the project to continue

·         Variations will be linked to the scope of work and whether there are alternatives that can be sourced
Payments ·         Principals may wish to change payment terms to accommodate contractors or subcontractors

·         As the effects of coronavirus move throughout the economy, there will undoubtedly be businesses that struggle and become insolvent. Where possible, Principals may want to consider changing milestone payments or frequency of payment claims to assist contractors’ cashflows

·         Any agreement between the Principal and relevant contractor should be evidenced in writing
Acceleration ·         If there is relatively small amount of work left, Principals may consider giving directions to accelerate

·         While this may increase the cost of the project, the Principal may be able to ensure the project is completed before shutdowns come into effect
Employment ·         Employment law advice should be sought about how to manage employee relationships while projects are on hold by reason of coronavirus
Teams and social distancing ·         Head contractors may wish to implement policies that flow down the contracting chain in relation to splitting teams and social distancing where possible
Other arrangements agreed between the parties ·         Sometimes the best changes are those made between the parties and not from the lawyers

·         However, even where this is the case, ensure that such agreements are evidenced in writing and you seek legal advice on the impacts of the agreement and whether there are any potential consequences that you may not have considered
Other issues
Financiers ·         In many developments, there may be a financier involved and different obligations that arise under these loans and security documents

·         Principals should consider their obligations to notify their financier(s) where appropriate
Other stakeholders ·         There may be a range of other stakeholders that may have an interest in the construction contracts

·         It is important to manage these aspects of the development to reduce or eliminate any potential problems later on
Dispute resolution
SOPA claims ·         At the time of writing, there have been no changes to the strict deadlines imposed on submitting and responding to payment claims under the NSW Security of Payment legislation

·         SOPA is a contractor friendly forum, allowing for money to flow down the contracting chain

·         SOPA claims can be challenged on jurisdictional grounds or can be settled at the end of the contract if there has been an overpayment
Alternative dispute resolutions ·         Many alternative dispute resolution professionals are not taking new appointments. This can create a delay in parties complying with the relevant dispute resolution clauses

·         Parties may consider teleconferences or videoconferences to resolve disputes, rather than physically meeting
Courts ·         Many courts are operating via videoconferencing, with physical appearances limited

·         The court process may have more delays than usual as judges and parties adjust to the temporary measures of case management

·         Where a party is seeking urgent injunctive or other relief, it is important to seek legal advice as soon as possible to ensure that an application can be made efficiently and protect your interests
Contract termination ·         If you are seeking to terminate the contract it is important to terminate in accordance with the contractual provisions and to consider any common law rights or duties in relation to termination

·         Those seeking to terminate where the counterparty has become insolvent will also need to be aware of the recent insolvency changes and the restrictions on terminating pursuant to insolvency