The ABCC is responsible for enforcing the following Commonwealth Acts and Regulations in relation to the building and construction industry:
These cover, but are not limited to:
- unlawful industrial action
- freedom of association
- coercion in agreement-making
- right of entry
- strike pay
- superannuation funds
Compliance powers
Section 52 of the BCII Act gives the ABC Commissioner power to compel a person to:
- provide information;
- produce documents; or
- attend to answer questions at an examination.
The ABCC regularly produces reports on the use of its compliance powers. These reports can be found on our Legal Reports page.
For more information regarding compliance powers please visit our Examinations page.
National Code of Practice
The ABCC is involved in investigating alleged breaches of the industrial relations provisions of the National Code of Practice for the Building and Construction Industry. To download the National Code, Implementation Guidelines and other relevant documents please visit the National Code page on this website. Information and advice about becoming Code compliant should be obtained from the Building and Construction Industry section of the Australian Government’s Workplace website.
Legal action
Where the ABCC suspects that breaches have occurred the ABC Commissioner can take legal action against those responsible. You can view the status of our legal matters in the Prosecutions and Interventions section of this website.
Interventions
The ABC Commissioner has jurisdiction to intervene in matters before the AIRC and in civil proceedings before the courts that involve a building industry participant or building work. For more information please see our fact sheet: Power to Intervene.
Referrals
Where we suspect that cases may involve breaches of laws other than the BCII Act, the WR Act or the IC Act, we can refer the relevant information to other Australian, State or Territory government bodies.
For more detailed information on our role, please visit About Us.