Weld Australia calls for procurement reform, stronger support for SMEs, and action to back local fabricators in the wake of the Productivity Commission’s interim report on fabricated steel safeguards.
Weld Australia has expressed profound disappointment at the Productivity Commission’s interim report into fabricated structural steel safeguards, released this morning, which concludes that safeguard measures are not warranted—despite the Commission’s own data showing that imports grew 28% over the five-year investigation period.
“The Productivity Commission has looked at an industry under siege and told it to wait,” said Weld Australia CEO Geoff Crittenden. “The Commission’s own report concedes that imports are rising, that employment has fallen from its peak, and that industry segments are facing difficult conditions. Yet its answer is that the damage is not ‘sudden’ or ‘serious’ enough to justify action. Tell that to the Australian welders and fabricators closing their doors.”
“When a fabricator walks away from the work it was built to do because it cannot compete with cheap imports, the Productivity Commission calls it ‘adjustment’. On the workshop floor, it is capability being lost—jobs, skills and hard-won technical knowledge that cannot be rebuilt overnight,” Crittenden said. “By the time an import surge is ‘recent, sudden, sharp and significant’ enough to satisfy WTO lawyers, there will be no industry left to safeguard.”
Crittenden said the interim report (open for public comment until 30 September 2026) demonstrates exactly why governments cannot hide behind legal thresholds and trade tribunals while local manufacturing capability disappears.
Weld Australia is calling on Federal and state governments to stop talking about the importance of Australian manufacturing and start backing local industry through practical, enforceable procurement and productivity reforms.
According to Crittenden, Australia’s manufacturing sector, particularly small and medium-sized fabricators, is being squeezed by rising costs, cheap imports, weak procurement settings and a lack of genuine support for local capability.
“Australia has a productivity problem, but too much of the national conversation starts and ends with cost,” Crittenden said. “Productivity is not about finding the cheapest bid or stripping another percentage point out of procurement. Real productivity comes from capability: better technology, better skills, better systems, better planning, better use of capital, and stronger local supply chains.”
Crittenden said governments of all political persuasions have spent decades talking about manufacturing, sovereign capability, regional jobs and apprenticeships, while too often awarding work to the cheapest offshore option.
“Governments talk about Australian jobs, then award work offshore. They talk about supply chain resilience, then rely on imported fabricated steel. They talk about sovereign capability, then allow the small and medium-sized fabricators that actually underpin that capability to be undercut,” Crittenden said. “That is not a manufacturing policy. It is short-term accounting dressed up as productivity.”
The Productivity Commission’s latest data shows labour productivity fell by 0.6% in the March 2026 quarter and grew by just 0.3% over the year, while multifactor productivity declined by 0.5% in 2024–25.
Crittenden said these figures should prompt a serious national conversation about how Australia builds and maintains industrial capability.
“Labour productivity drives economic growth, real wages and living standards. If we want Australians to earn more, build more, export more and compete globally, we need to invest in the businesses that actually produce things,” Crittenden said. “For Australian fabricators, the confidence to invest is being destroyed.”
SMEs under pressure
Weld Australia says the crisis facing small and medium-sized businesses is being felt across the fabrication sector.
ASIC has reported that 47,728 businesses have entered insolvency since May 2022, including 14,011 during the 2025–26 financial year alone. The construction industry has recorded more than 10,000 insolvencies over the past four years.
“Most Australian fabricators are SMEs. They are not multinational primes, and they do not have endless balance sheets,” Crittenden said. “They do not have dedicated teams to manage every new compliance obligation, nor do they have the market power to simply pass on every cost increase. Yet these are the businesses we will rely on to build the future.”
Weld Australia said local fabricators will be essential to Australia’s defence, AUKUS, shipbuilding, infrastructure, power generation, renewable energy, transmission, mining and critical minerals ambitions, as well as the ongoing maintenance and repair of existing assets.
“If these companies disappear, we cannot recreate their capability overnight,” Crittenden said. “A welding workshop is not just a building full of machines. It is people, procedures and decades of trade knowledge. It is supervisors, welders, inspectors, apprentices, relationships, experience and hard-won technical judgement. Once that is gone, it is gone.”
Australia must back its own industry
Crittenden said other countries understand the importance of backing domestic industry in the national interest.
“When Canada was hit with new United States tariffs, its government did not respond with another industry roundtable and a promise to consider options. It announced targeted countermeasures and a $7.5 billion package of support for workers and businesses, including specific liquidity support for SMEs and targeted measures for steel and aluminium,” Crittenden said. “That is what it looks like when a country backs its industry. Australia needs the same clarity of purpose.”
Weld Australia is calling for practical, enforceable, productivity-focused industrial policy, starting with government procurement. “Price matters, but it cannot be the only measure,” Crittenden said.
“The right price, the right quality and delivery on time should be the baseline. Government procurement must also consider local content, standards compliance, whole-of-life value, sovereign capability, skills development, supply chain resilience and the economic return generated when Australian businesses employ Australian workers and train Australian apprentices.”
Imported fabricated steel must be held to the same standards
Weld Australia is also calling for stronger enforcement of standards for imported fabricated steel.
“Australian fabricators are expected to comply with Australian Standards, maintain welding procedures, employ qualified people, keep records, pass inspections and meet safety obligations,” Crittenden said.
“Imported fabricated steel must be held to the same bar. If it complies, it should be welcome. If it does not, it should not be used.”
Crittenden said local industry cannot be expected to compete against imported products that are not subject to the same level of compliance scrutiny. “This is not about protectionism. It is about fair competition, public safety and sovereign capability,” he said.
“Productivity is not achieved by squeezing Australian manufacturers until they break. It is achieved by giving them the work, certainty and confidence to invest,” he said.
“If we want Australian jobs, we must buy from Australian industry. If we want sovereign capability, we must maintain the fabricators who make it possible. If we want productivity, we must invest in the people, technology and businesses that actually produce things.”
“Australian welders and fabricators are not asking for special treatment. They’re simply asking for a fair go.”
About us:
Weld Australia represents the welding profession in Australia. Its members are made up of individual welding professionals and companies of all sizes. Weld Australia members are involved almost every facet of Australian industry and make a significant contribution to the nation’s economy. The primary goal of Weld Australia is to ensure that the Australian welding industry remains locally and globally competitive, both now and into the future. Weld Australia is the Australian representative member of the International Institute of Welding (IIW). For more information or to join Weld Australia, please visit: https://weldaustralia.com.au/
Contact details:
Sally Wood on 0434 442 687 or [email protected]