Steel audit at top of the agenda
Christchurch-based Challenge Steel has appointed two new directors as it prepares to increase imported volumes of fabricated steel from China.
At the same time, a liquidator’s report has been filed over an unrelated failed steel fabricator Elphinstone & Morris set up just two years ago.
Challenge Steel majority owner and chairman Bert Govan said his company was leading the way with robust auditing.
He was on a business trip this week in China with new directors Tony Sewell and Geoff Cranko.
Chinese steel factory laboratory tests were independently tested and overseen by China-based Kiwi third party inspectors from Southern QA, Govan said.
In addition, samples were also sent to a testing laboratory in Penrose, Auckland, plus clients or councils could take their own further random samples.
Govan said that to save costs the steel would be imported in components for installation ‘‘a bit like meccano’’ rather than fabricated in New Zealand.
The steel would be used for infrastructure as well as commercial buildings.
Meanwhile, the first liquidator’s report on collapsed Elphinstone & Morris reports outstanding identified debts of more than $1.5 million.
The Tasmanian founders Darren Elphinstone and Danny Morris reportedly leased a Wigram industrial warehouse and carried out steel fabrication work for the recently completed BNZ Centre as a contractor for Leighs Construction.
It was one of 90 members of steel association Steel Construction NZ whose chief executive Alistair Fussell said he understood the bust company had subcontracted out the BNZ work.
Some companies had thought the Christchurch rebuild would be a fast bonanza but it had turned out to be a ‘‘slow burner’’. Local business relationships were important, he said.
When Elphinstone & Morris arrived in Christchurch in 2014 the principals referred to the rebuild as a ‘‘candy store’’ with lack of competition costing developers 15 per cent more for steel than they should be.
The two directors are believed to have returned to Australia and could not be contacted.
ACC has banned investments
State-owned ACC had investments in six companies on its exclusion list in the last year, including $1.4 million in arms manufacturer Lockheed Martin. The fund manager said it had not broken the law. The shares were bought by a collective investment vehicle, managed by Orbis Investment Management, which ACC was part of. The investment was detected in December as part of a routine review, and at the time such pooled investment did not come under ACC’s ethical investment rules. Other indirect investments were in Imperial Brands, British American Tobacco, Serco and Barrick Gold. The investments are no longer held.
Ratcliffe steps down
Mark Ratcliffe says he is not intending to take another full-time job after he steps down as chief executive of network company Chorus around the middle of next year. Ratcliffe, 59, said the time felt to right to retire from the job, and he might in future seek roles as a director, adviser or consultant, though not with Chorus or its competitors. Ratcliffe negotiated the transition from Gattung-era Telecom, where he was chief operating officer, to the new world of ‘‘structural separation’’ and ultrafast broadband (UFB). It comes after Chorus posted a flat profit of $91 million for the year to June 30.