NSW Con­struc­tion Indus­try Shut Down – Par­tial re-open­ing as of 31 July 2021

On Wednes­day 28 July 2021, the NSW Pre­mier took steps to re-open cer­tain con­struc­tion sites in parts of Greater Syd­ney fol­low­ing the ear­li­er con­struc­tion indus­try shut down orders which came into effect on 17 July 2021.

Amend­ments have been made by the Pub­lic Health (COVID-19 Tem­po­rary Move­ment and Gath­er­ing Restric­tions) Amend­ment (No 17) Order 2021 effec­tive from 31 July 2021 (the Amend­ed Orders).

In brief:

• cer­tain works can recom­mence on con­struc­tion sites which are deemed both unoc­cu­pied and occu­pied sites out­side of ​‘affect­ed areas’.*
• While the restric­tions on unoc­cu­pied con­struc­tion sites have been relaxed some­what, there are still heavy restric­tions at occu­pied places of residence .
• Works per­formed at occu­pied places of res­i­dence must be ​‘nec­es­sary’ and ​‘pre­scribed work’ as defined by clause 22B(4) and (5) of the Amend­ed Orders.

Work on con­struc­tion sites:

• In areas not deemed as ​‘affect­ed areas’, it appears that gen­er­al con­struc­tion works on ​‘con­struc­tion sites’ can recom­mence pro­vid­ed that work­ers com­ply with the req­ui­site con­di­tions on per­for­mance of those works and com­ply with all Covid-19 safe­ty pro­to­cols as stat­ed under the Amend­ed Orders.
• All works per­formed on an unoc­cu­pied con­struc­tion site, not in an ​‘affect­ed area’, must be per­formed in accor­dance with a Reg­is­tered Covid-19 Safe­ty Plan.
• A plan must be writ­ten by both Principal/​Owners and Contractors.
• Pru­dent Con­trac­tors should, mov­ing for­ward, use the Safe­ty Plan as part of a con­trac­tor’s dai­ly tool box talk and fur­ther, should form part of the dai­ly Job Safe­ty Analy­sis plan.
• This would assist employ­ers and Head Con­trac­tors ensur­ing that staff on site are aware of the Safe­ty Plan and any updates each day before com­menc­ing works.
• While not manda­to­ry, we would also sug­gest that per­sons per­form­ing works on occu­pied con­struc­tion sites should also Reg­is­ter a Covid-19 Safe­ty Plan in order to ensure the safe­ty of them­selves and those per­sons around them.
• For those seek­ing assis­tance the fol­low­ing link pro­vides all nec­es­sary infor­ma­tion for Prin­ci­pals and Con­trac­tors relat­ing to sub­mis­sion of a Covid-19 Safe­ty Plan: https://​www​.nsw​.gov​.au/​c​o​v​i​d​-​1​9​/​c​o​v​i​d​-​s​a​f​e​/​c​o​n​s​t​r​u​c​t​i​o​n​-​a​n​d​-​t​r​a​d​e​s​p​eople
• Omit­ted from the Amend­ed Orders are any con­di­tions relat­ing to non-res­i­den­tial occu­pied con­struc­tion sites.
• It is pre­sumed for the health and safe­ty of all per­sons that these types of works should be per­formed under a hybrid cat­e­gori­sa­tion of unoc­cu­pied and occu­pied con­struc­tion works. Accord­ing­ly, where the Orders make no com­ment on these types of works, we sug­gest the work­ing con­di­tions should be rel­a­tive to the same restric­tions on occu­pied res­i­den­tial premis­es being a max­i­mum of 2 peo­ple per room and a max­i­mum of 5 peo­ple in total in larg­er indi­vid­ual areas with any occu­pants not being in the same space as per­sons per­form­ing works. 

* Please note there are no for­mal guide­lines pro­vid­ed in this regard.

Work at places of residence 

Clause 22B of the Amend­ed Orders pro­vides that a per­son can­not enter a place of res­i­dence to car­ry out pre­scribed works unless those works are: 

• nec­es­sary
• in a non-affect­ed area*; and
• no more than 2 work­ers are vis­it­ing the place of res­i­dence to car­ry out any work (what so ever); and
• no per­son oth­er than anoth­er work­er is present in the same room as the works are being under­tak­en, unless the works are tak­ing place in an ​‘out­door’ set­ting where a max­i­mum of 5 works may attend.

Nec­es­sary works

Works able to be under­tak­en at a place of res­i­dence are still lim­it­ed and only include works where:

• the work is urgent­ly required to be car­ried out;
• to ensure the health, safe­ty or secu­ri­ty of the place of res­i­dence or per­sons resid­ing at the place of res­i­dence, or
• because of an emer­gency, or

the work is: 

• for the instal­la­tion, main­te­nance or repair of an essen­tial util­i­ty, includ­ing a water, gas, elec­tric­i­ty, inter­net, tele­vi­sion or telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions ser­vice, or
• for fire pro­tec­tion and safe­ty, or

for pre­scribed work that is clean­ing or repairs and main­te­nance — the work is car­ried out:

• at a place or res­i­dence that is unoc­cu­pied when the work is being car­ried out, and
• because it is nec­es­sary for the sale or lease of the place of residence.

By way of exam­ple, this means that if you are occu­py­ing your home dur­ing ren­o­va­tions, works at your home can­not take place unless they are nec­es­sary pre­scribed works.

Pre­scribed works

Pre­scribed works include:

• clean­ing;
• repairs and maintenance;
• alter­ations and addi­tions to building;
• work car­ried out as part of a trade, includ­ing elec­tri­cal work or plumbing.
• Work­ers per­form­ing works on con­struc­tions sites or places of res­i­dences as set out above, must not be from an ​‘affect­ed area’ or trav­el into a ​‘affect­ed area’ unless they are deemed an autho­rised person.

Work­ers from/​to an affect­ed area

• For those work­ers won­der­ing if they are able to attend their con­struc­tion sites out­side of their LGA, please see the fol­low­ing link which iden­ti­fies autho­rised per­sons who are eli­gi­ble to leave their LGA. https://​www​.nsw​.gov​.au/​c​o​v​i​d​-​1​9​/​r​u​l​e​s​/​a​u​t​h​o​r​i​s​e​d​-​w​o​rkers
• The works which are per­mit­ted on a con­struc­tion site with­in an ​‘affect­ed area’ are as follows:
• to ensure the safe­ty or secu­ri­ty of the con­struc­tion site;
• to deal with envi­ron­men­tal risks;
• to main­tain and ensure the integri­ty of crit­i­cal plant, equip­ment or assets, includ­ing par­tial­ly com­plet­ed works, that would oth­er­wise deteriorate;
• to receive deliv­er­ies of sup­plies that would oth­er­wise deteriorate;
• to main­tain pub­lic utilities;
• to ensure the safe oper­a­tion of exist­ing trans­port infrastructure;
• by or on behalf of NSW Health in response to the COVID-19 pandemic;
• because of an emergency.

Works in an affect­ed area

At this time only per­sons locat­ed with­in an affect­ed area may per­form works in that spe­cif­ic area. Accord­ing­ly, where the above works may need to be per­formed, you will need to con­sid­er whether your usu­al con­trac­tors have capac­i­ty to per­form those works. 

The above list­ed works are very sim­i­lar to those works which were per­mit­ted under the pre­vi­ous clause 24AB(1) of the Orders which affect­ed all of Greater Syd­ney. Accord­ing­ly, we refer to our arti­cle dat­ed 21 July 2021 which breaks down what works can be per­formed in this context. 

https://​www​.swaab​.com​.au/​p​u​b​l​i​c​a​t​i​o​n​/​d​e​a​l​i​n​g​-​w​i​t​h​-​t​h​e​-​n​s​w​-​c​o​n​s​t​r​u​c​t​i​o​n​-​i​n​d​u​s​t​r​y​-​s​h​u​t​-​d​o​w​n​-​m​a​n​a​g​i​n​g​-​e​x​i​s​t​i​n​g​-​works

Per­for­mance of Works in rela­tion to Stra­ta Schemes 

• For those per­sons either resid­ing in or man­ag­ing Stra­ta Schemes, it appears that the same rules apply for both sin­gle dwelling and mul­ti dwelling occu­pied res­i­den­tial premises.
• At this time, the only delin­eation of what works are per­mit­ted any what is not, is focused sole­ly on whether the build­ing resides in an ​‘affect­ed area’ not­ing that there is a require­ment for per­sons in ​‘com­mon prop­er­ty’ areas in stra­ta schemes wear masks at all times.
• If you are a con­trac­tor con­tract­ed to per­form nec­es­sary pre­scribed works in an indi­vid­ual lot in a Stra­ta Scheme, it appears that ren­o­va­tion works may be per­formed but you will be restrict­ed to a max­i­mum of two per­sons per­form­ing those works with­in any lot and a max­i­mum of 5 per­sons with­in com­mon prop­er­ty areas, pro­vid­ed those works are not deemed nec­es­sary works.
• If your con­trac­tor lives with­in an ​‘affect­ed area’ then they are not per­mit­ted to per­form works unless they are a deemed, autho­rised person.
• In so far as your own­ers cor­po­ra­tion’s right to refuse access to indi­vid­ual lots in a stra­ta scheme to Con­trac­tors, you should con­sult the rel­e­vant by-laws and liaise with your stra­ta man­ag­er to deter­mine whether your scheme is able to pre­vent cer­tain per­sons from pass­ing through the com­mon prop­er­ty to gain access to your indi­vid­ual lot to per­form the pre­scribed works.

Dis­claimer: The above is not to be con­sid­ered legal advice and that you should seek your own inde­pen­dent legal advice should you have any queries regard­ing the above or the new­ly amend­ed Gov­ern­ment Orders. 

*Note these amend­ments do not apply to sites locat­ed in the ​‘affect­ed areas’ as iden­ti­fied in our ear­li­er article:

https://​www​.swaab​.com​.au/​n​e​w​s​/​c​o​n​s​t​r​u​c​t​i​o​n​-​s​h​u​t​-​d​o​w​n​-​u​p​d​a​t​e​-​r​e​c​o​m​m​i​s​s​i​o​n​i​n​g​-​o​r​-​c​o​m​m​e​n​c​e​m​e​n​t​-​w​o​r​k​s​-​a​l​l​o​w​e​d​-​o​n​-​c​e​r​t​a​i​n​-​c​o​n​s​t​r​u​c​t​i​o​n​-​s​i​t​e​s​-​a​s​-​o​f​-​2​9​-​j​u​l​y​-2021