Construction work has been halted in locked-down regions and workers have been unable to travel from metropolitan to regional areas or vice-versa.
MBV executive director of growth and relationships Mell Greenall said having borders between Melbourne and the rest of the state was an issue for the industry.
“MBV would ... like to see restrictions removed on workers travelling between regional Victoria and Melbourne when we re-open next week,” she said.
“Prior to the recent two-week shutdown, about one in four workers were not able to access sites because a lot of workers and specialist trades came from regional Victoria."
She said having a heavy-handed approach to shutting down the entire industry - which was done in response to rising case numbers stemming from construction sites - should have been handled differently.
“MBV would like to see a stringent compliance regime that would shut down sites that are non-compliant, rather than shutting down our whole industry,” Ms Greenall said.
She said MBV asked the the government to distinguish between different sectors in the industry.
“Shutting down our entire industry may have lacked nuance in differentiating between these sectors, which includes large commercial and smaller residential builders,” she said.
She said vaccination rates for the industry were unavailable, but the MBV supported vaccination and recommended people get the jab.
