Former Infrastructure Minister Steve Kons says the government's proposed infrastructure plan to rebuild the state's economy most importantly needs to attract private sector confidence.
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The government will next week unveil the plan which Premier Peter Gutwein has labelled the most aggressive infrastructure plan in the state's history.
Now Burnie mayor, Cr Kons said public infrastructure was not the answer to addressing economic woes.
"If you want to get the economy kicking off again, you get the private sector involved and support them directly, rather than infrastructure projects," he said.
"The private sector will squeeze as much value out of a dollar as it can and make it go further."
Master Builders Tasmania executive director Matthew Pollock said the state's building industry was too big to be propped up by public money alone and would need the private sector to contribute to a construction-led recovery.
"One of the things we are going to see in this economic recovery phase is that we are going to be increasingly competing for private money," he said.
Mr Pollock said he believed the state's construction industry would have the capacity to respond to the government's plan.
"If we let the pipeline deteriorate, we risk losing jobs, we risk losing apprentices, and potentially we risk losing people to the mainland where states have big infrastructure plans of their own," he said.
"I think it is important that the state's infrastructure plan is developed in parallel with a workforce plan to ensure we build skills and capacity within the industry for the long-term."
Premier's Economic and Social Recovery Advisory Council chairman Don Challen said there were big dollars behind the government's infrastructure plan.
He said while many of the state's construction companies had weathered the impacts from coronavirus well, private sector confidence in the real estate sector had been dented.
Mr Challen said he had heard people at the front-end of construction - like planners, architects, and surveyors - were beginning to feel the pinch more.
He said these companies would not be eligible to benefit from the federal government's JobKeeper program as the scheme was based on activity in March and April.
