Aether Brewing‘s “Hop, Skip & Jump” garnered back-to-back awards as “Champion Strong Beer” and “Best Queensland Beer of Show” at the recently concluded Royal Queensland Food & Wine Show (RQFWS) held at the Brisbane Showgrounds on the 3rd of March, 2021.
According to RQFWS Beer Advisory Group member and judge Steve Henderson, “IPA is a style of beer with many components that need to come together to create a balanced drinking experience,” which makes creating a particularly masterful and award-winning IPA a difficult task.
“…the Aether team is laser focused on improving their product with each batch they brew,” Mr. Henderson adds. “I look forward to seeing Aether Brewing’s beers distributed nationally as the whole of Australia needs to see how good Queensland craft beer is.”
Earning a grand total of 18.0 points in the Strong Beer category, Hop, Skip & Jump beat out 22 other submissions to win a Gold award — one of the 39 given out amongst 485 different entries.
The Aether Brewing brewery can be found at 340 Melton Rd, Northgate. They’re open from 3:00PM to 7:00PM on Friday and 12:00PM to 7:00PM on Saturdays and Sundays. Follow their social media accounts on Facebook and Instagram for the latest updates. For more details, visit their website.
In a move to ensure workers are paid in full and on time, the government has announced the first three projects to benefit from Project Bank Accounts. The projects include a social housing project in Nundah, a replacement Fire and Rescue Station in Richmond, and the Inala Community Centre.
An estimate of up to 180 construction workers will be protected by Project Bank Accounts. Minister for Housing and Public Works Mick de Brenni said that the implementation of the Project Bank Accounts helps in making sure that all subcontractors get the pay they deserve for the work they have completed.
Photo credit: FaceMePLS/Wikimedia Commons
Security of Payment
Unfortunately, there are dishonest operators in the construction industry who use non-payment as a business model. Such act has caused some subcontractors to close business and workers have been left unpaid.
Because of this, the government has implemented Project Bank Accounts to ensure fairness in the payments. PBA ensures that all parties relevant to a project are paid on dates set out in the contract.
As a start, every project tendered by the Queensland Government from 1 March 2018 will use PBAs on building and construction projects that are valued between one million and 10 million dollars except for engineering projects.
Once the implementation is proven successful, PBAs will also be applied to private sector projects valued one million dollars and above. Implementation on private sectors, however, will not be carried out before 1 March 2019.
Photo credit: CC-BY/Sean Hagen/Flickr
Project Bank Account
A PBA is basically a set of three bank accounts operating as a trust.
These are the General Trust Account where the Principal makes the payment, a Retention Trust Account which holds the subcontractor’s retention money, and a Disputed Funds Trust Account which holds amounts to be paid on certain disputes until resolution.
To address concerns from the industry, Mr de Brenni said that a strict compliance regime was also established to make sure that funds in the PBAs will only be used to pay licensees that have performed the work.
“That compliance regime includes penalties up to 2 years in prison,” he added.
Photo credit: רנדום/Wikimedia Commons
This is just one of the measures taken by the government to address the issues on unpaid and overdue invoices for subcontractors. Queensland’s new Building Industry Fairness (Security of Payment) Act 2017 has been, by far, the strongest protection for building subcontractors offered by a state government in Australia.
For the requirements and other information regarding PBAs, visit the Department of Housing and Public Works Building Industry Fairness Reforms—Project Bank Accounts official page. You may also visit the Security of Payment page to learn about other measures under the new Act.
