Page 37 - Week 01 - Tuesday, 14 February 2012
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morning—that we would go out to the marketplace seeking expressions of interest but not provide the private sector with an indication of what we would require—is a farcical approach to procurement.
If the Leader of the Opposition is suggesting that the government as a client would just say, “We are just thinking about this; would you go away on spec and do all this work for us,” and suggesting that as a client we would not give the property sector some indication of our requirements before going to an expressions of interest process—that would be an interesting way to conduct procurement.
As I indicated in August last year, after exploring a range of financing and ownership options for new accommodation, our consultants made a series of recommendations. I said:
… I want this advice tested in the marketplace.
We heard strong representations from the ACT Property Council that their members could meet the government’s accommodation needs in Gungahlin and Civic in a cost-effective manner by building and owning properties which the ACT government would rent over an extended period. I said at that time that I wanted to give the property industry the opportunity to deliver. I said that in August last year. And I said that we would make our final decision “based on the best overall value to the ACT taxpayer, including build cost, environmental performance, occupational health and safety issues for staff, running costs, efficiencies to be gained by having key public servants in the same location”—as well as our commitment to apprentices, trainees and Indigenous Canberrans in the construction of the project.
That was on 13 August last year. On 24 August the Assembly debated a motion requiring the government’s office accommodation strategy and future office buildings in Gungahlin and Civic to ensure that the feasibility studies and market testing for that accommodation included an examination of the adaptive reuse of existing office buildings and consideration of the options for an ACT government office precinct as opposed to a single building model and to ensure that the whole-of-life-cycle analysis of the environmental impact is considered before finalising the government’s office accommodation strategy.
I repeat it again: in that debate in August last year, the government’s immediate priority was the delivery of the Gungahlin office accommodation. There would appear to be a burst of consensus across the Assembly in relation to the need to fast-track that Gungahlin project, and the Chief Minister and I were pleased to be able to announce last month that there were nine expressions of interest from the private sector to deliver the government’s accommodation requirements in the Gungahlin town sector. Those expressions of interest have been through a process, and I will shortly announce the short list and the continued development of that Gungahlin project.
I indicated, and I have done so on a number of occasions, that once the Gungahlin process was well underway we would look at options for our accommodation needs in the city. The Chief Minister and I made an announcement again last month in relation
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