St Hilliers Construction, which two months ago won major public housing projects in New South Wales, went into voluntary administration on Wednesday. The move created havoc on the company's building projects in Illawarra, Shoalhaven, Coffs Harbour and Victoria.

Although work on most of the sites, which were failed public housing projects, is almost complete, most of the workers have not been paid.

A sister company, St Hilliers Ararat, which is part of the Aegis Correction Partnership consortium that was tasked with the $350-million upgrade of the Ararat Prison in central Victoria was also placed into liquidation after it failed to secure $150 million additional funding from its bankers and other project investors.

To act as administrators of the two collapsed firms is the accounting firm Moore Stephens. St Hilliers Construction, registered with NSW, has an annual turnover of $500 million and has 300 employees and 1,000 subcontractors.

The development would place a number of construction jobs at risk.

Tim Casey, who operated St Hilliers Construction, sold in December 2011 his Bellevue Hill home for $13 million in a bid to raise more capital for the company.

"We have over a number of months explored and exhausted all possible avenues to recapitalise the construction business and find a solution to the significant cost and time overruns on the Ararat project," The Courier quoted Mr Casey.

The firm owes millions to subcontractors of Reed Construction, which likewise stopped work on its road projects in March also due to financial problems. The Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU) blames the failures on the Victoria government which failed to reach an agreement on financing the project.

CFMEU state secretary for Victoria, Bill Oliver, pointed out that St Hilliers raised its concern to the state government in December 2011. St Hilliers was involved in 12 NSW projects as part of the state's nation building economic stimulus plan.

NSW Public Works is organising a meeting with the management of St Hilliers and the administrator to tackle the status of the government contracts and determine what would happen to the 12 public housing projects.

Prior to its collapse, St Hilliers Construction just finished the Chullora marketplace project and was involved in the development of apartment buildings in Dalinghurst, Milson Point and Manly, and the construction of Cranbrook and Trinity Grammar, which are exclusive private schools.

However, Victorian Premier Ted Baillieu insisted the responsibility to finish the prison projects falls on the consortium partners, but no tax money would be used to bail out the failed construction firms and no additional payments would be made.

"I'll make it very clear: this is a public-private partnership and the risk attaches to the private consortium.... That's the basis of its, and it's up to the members of that consortium to do what's necessary to complete the project," Design Build quoted the premier.

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