“Don’t let a bunch of stupid anti-vaxxers stuff it up.”

That call from Scott Hutchinson, chairman of Hutchinson Builders—Australia’s largest private construction company—sums up the overriding sentiment of a beleaguered industry at boiling point and being pushed to the brink.

Already buckling under pressure from crippling supply shortages and skyrocketing building costs, the construction industry's troubles have suddenly got much worse this week.