TPG Engineering, led by Chris Tipper
Plumbing recruitment for commercial, service and construction teams.
Plumbing hiring is competitive because experienced commercial plumbers, service plumbers and plumbing supervisors rarely need to look for work. They weigh project pipeline, travel, on-call expectations, vehicle arrangements and whether the business runs well before they consider moving. Advertising alone is slow in this market because the people you want are already employed.
Jobs and Skills Australia lists plumbers among the trades in national shortage, and demand keeps building across commercial construction, fit out, maintenance contracts and data centre and industrial work that competes for the same licensed capability. The shortage is not just numbers. It is a shortage of suitable, available people who fit the environment: a service plumber, a commercial construction plumber and a plumbing supervisor on an industrial package are not interchangeable.
If plumbing hiring is recurring rather than occasional, the Trades Workforce Partnership Programme should be the next conversation. It is built for plumbing, mechanical and building services businesses that hire more than once, with recruitment terms that can improve by up to 20% as the relationship grows.
Roles we fill
- Construction Manager
- Project Manager
- Site Manager
- Design Manager
- Foreman and Supervisor
- Contract Administrator
- Project Engineer and Site Engineer
- MEP design engineers: mechanical, electrical and hydraulic
- Drafters and BIM coordinators
- Estimator
- Quantity Surveyor
- Health, Safety and Environment Advisor
- Scheduler and Planner
- Building Supervisor
- Electricians, plumbers, HVAC technicians, carpenters, joiners and shopfitters
- Labourers and trades assistants
Compliant on day one, and still compliant in month six
Every person we put forward is checked against the role and the site before you see a name, and the checks do not stop at the start date. Tickets, licences and inductions are held against each person with their expiry dates, so a renewal is flagged before the shift rather than discovered on site. Onboarding, e-signatures, inductions, rostering and timesheets run through the one system, and the records are there when the auditor asks.
- White Card sighted, expiry date recorded
- High risk work licences and plant tickets, held with their expiry dates so a renewal is flagged before it lapses
- Verification of competency for the plant and tasks on your site
- Right to work and ID verified before anyone is presented
- Project and site inductions completed before day one
- SWMS and WHS acknowledgements signed digitally and kept on record
- Two referees on every candidate
How we can work together
Permanent
Contingent or retained. Every permanent hire carries a 12 month replacement guarantee on our standard terms.
Contract
Project based hires with onboarding, timesheets and WHS handled by us.
Labour hire
Trades and labourers on site fast, compliant, with payroll and inductions covered.
Straight answers for this market
All guidesWhat does a commercial plumbing foreman or hydraulics project manager earn in Sydney in 2026?
On a live Sydney brief in September 2026, a Project Manager running commercial hydraulic packages of $1m to $5m and above is offered $140,000 to $170,000 plus super, with a vehicle or allowance and performance incentives negotiable.
Read the answerWhat does a senior mechanical engineer earn at a Sydney mechanical services contractor in 2026?
On a live Sydney brief in September 2026, a national HVAC and mechanical services contractor is offering $160,000 to $180,000 base plus super for a Senior Mechanical Engineer who can sit in design meetings and hold their own, then help deliver the outcome.
Read the answerWhat does a tradie or site leader need in place before starting on a commercial or data centre site in Australia?
Before day one on a commercial construction site in Australia a worker needs a current General Construction Induction card, the White Card, plus any high risk work licences and plant tickets the role calls for, verification of competency for the plant and tasks on that site, right to work and ID checked, the project or site specific induction completed, and SWMS and WHS acknowledgements signed.
Read the answerBook a discovery call
Tell Chris about the project and the team around the hire. He will confirm a realistic timeline when he takes the brief.