Jobs on the line at Transmission Gully
Redundancies could be on the table for those building the delayed billiondollar Transmission Gully project, meanwhile close to 100 workers are still stuck overseas due to Covid-19.
It comes after the Transport Agency admitted sections of the 27km stretch of road needed to be relaid after an error, and contractors aired concerns about the way the project is being managed.
The troubled four-lane motorway project has already blown its budget and is significantly delayed.
It’s being built through a publicprivate partnership, the Wellington Gateway Partnership (WGP), with CPB Contractors and HEB Construction sub-contracted to carry out the design and construction.
Amalgamated Workers Union NZ National Secretary Maurice Davis said he received the proposition of 98 redundancies from CPB on Friday.
There was some discussion over the weekend and then the proposal was withdrawn on Sunday so CPB could negotiate with NZTA and hopefully come to a resolution, he said.
Davis said he understood the negotiations related to the payment of previously agreed settlement money.
Earlier this year it was revealed the cost of the project blew out to more than $1 billion after NZTA agreed to pay the contractor another $190.6 million in a settlement over delays by the 2016 Kaikoura earthquake, and flooding around the same time.
Davis said it appeared NZTA and CPB have had a “falling out” and the project was “way behind” schedule.
“Those workers are the meat in the sandwich in between a battle of wills between NZTA and CPB, that’s what it boils down to and that’s the sad thing about this unseemly stoush.
“We’ve got to stand aside and let the private part of the partnership talk to the public side and hopefully they can come to a resolution.”
NZTA said as it was still in commercial negotiations with the joint venture, it was not able to provide further comment at this stage.
CIMIC, which is CPB’S Australian parent, declined to comment.
Following the Covid-19 lockdown, the road is now not expected to open until 2021 at the earliest.
A significant portion of the site engineering and supervision team, about 80 roles, and some of the operations personnel, are at home overseas after leaving the country due to Covid-19.