THE Nationals WA have criticised the State government for awarding Western Australia's regional infrastructure contracts to interstate and Perth-based businesses over regionally and locally-based companies.
Party leader Mia Davies said there had been a number of examples where there was a clear failure of the government to invest into WA's regional businesses.
Ms Davies referred to stage one of the Geraldton Health Campus, to which the government committed $73.1 million of capital investment over five years as part of the 2018-19 State Budget.
"The contracts for phase one of Geraldton Hospital redevelopment clearly showed the Labor government's Buy Local policy is failing," Ms Davies said.
"Of 24 services such as consultancy and project management required for the hospital rebuild only two were provided by local contractors.
"It goes directly against the Buy Local policy and shows that the Labor government is failing to deliver on its promise to support regional businesses.
"When regional centres are denied the much-needed financial benefits of the projects in their backyards, it impacts local economies which need all the help they can get as the strive to rebound from the effects of COVID-19."
Ms Davies said the State government awarding two contracts valued at $75m and $50m to a Malaga-based company to manufacture new modern firefighting vehicles in Collie had left the local community "seeing red".
"Capable businesses, already doing the work and based in Collie and Narrogin, were overlooked to award the deal to a Perth-based company," Ms Davies said.
"Even more galling was the payment of $2.5m of taxpayers dollars to the Perth firm to set up shop in Collie where there were already local companies and workers carrying out the work.
"It is a blow to regional communities and their economies when local businesses and workers miss out on major contracts in their own backyard."
Premier Mark McGowan rebutted Ms Davies statement's in parliament recently.
"We have tender processes and the tender processes under the Jobs Act ensure that there is a focus on local content," Mr McGowan said.
"Often we find that the businesses that win those tender processes, in fact under the law, are required to demonstrate how much local content is part of the actual contract.
"We are doing a $73.5m upgrade to Geraldton Hospital - the first part of the tender, as I recall, went to an earthmoving company that demonstrated the highest levels of local content.
"That was about an $8m component.
"One of the best firefighting appliance manufacturing firms in the entire country is relocating a large part of its operations to Collie and the member is complaining.
"It is going to become a maintenance centre for the region and because of the scale and ability of this company, the Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions or other government organisations will be able to do work in Collie that they could not do before."
The Esperance TAFE rebuild, design of the Hedland Senior High School which will be receiving a $15m upgrade and the use of a Perth architect for the Kalgoorlie Renal Hostel were also highlighted by Ms Davies as government projects that hadn't utilised local businesses.
Perth-based businesses T&Z Architects were appointed to work on the design for the new build at Hedland Senior High School and MPS Architects were appointed for the upgrades to Hardie House, while EMCO Construction, another Perth-based business had also been awarded the contract for South Regional TAFE's new Esperance campus - an $18.34m facility which will replace the existing ageing campus.
Under the Western Australian Industry Participation Strategy (WAIPS), the government will monitor the number of regional contractors employed through the construction phase and EMCO Building's WAIPS commitment to ensure local benefit.
To give WA's regional businesses a better chance of securing contracts in their local areas, Ms Davies said more work needed to be done to prevent head contractors from overlooking local workers in the construction chain.
"The State government needs to strengthen and increase the role of local content advisers in regional WA, longer lead times in advance of announcing tenders for significant projects so they can co-operate or work with others to keep the work locally, increase the weighting for regional businesses tendering for government projects and expand the Local Capability Fund to support tenders for major projects in regional WA," Ms Davies said.
While regional business should not be restricted to winning contracts only in the area in which they are based, Ms Davies said there had to be a reasonable opportunity for them to secure contracts in their local area.
"Every contract assists them to grow, maintain their workforce, support apprentices and trainees and reinvest in their community," Ms Davies said.