The following Question Without Notice was asked by the Member for Roe, Peter Rundle MLA and answered today by Emergency Services Minister Hon Fran Logan MLA.
FIREFIGHTING — TRUCKS AND APPLIANCES — TENDERING CONTRACTS
Mr P. RUNDLE to the Minister for Emergency Services:
I refer to tenders and contracts awarded for the construction and maintenance of firefighting vehicles in WA’s regional areas.
(1) Why are some portions of contracts awarded to companies from the eastern states when there are reliable and competent companies in WA that can deliver to the highest standard?
(2) Why has the minister’s department taken three years to award a contract in light class vehicles, in the process requiring tender applicants to agree to keep their tender bids valid over this period?
Mr F. LOGAN replied:
I thank the member for that question.
(1)–(2) The question presumes that those contracts have gone to eastern states companies; that is just not true. There has not been an announcement on the 44 heavy bush firefighting appliances or the light-firefighting vehicle. It will be up to the bushfire brigades to choose another vehicle, which will either be what they call an ultralight or a slightly heavier light-firefighting vehicle, that will be introduced to the fleet. That contract has not been put out yet either.
The Department of Fire and Emergency Services, Building Management and Works, and the Department of Finance are organising those contracts—not me. I have no role to play, and nor should I, in determining the outcome of those contracts, but I assure the member that they have not been issued yet. He and everyone else will know about it once they are issued.
FIREFIGHTING — TRUCKS AND APPLIANCES — TENDERING CONTRACTS (Supplementary Question)
Mr P.J. RUNDLE to the Minister for Emergency Services:
We are three years down the track, so can the minister assure those servicing our firefighting sector that future opportunities will be sourced from our state so that others do not suffer the fate of businesses in my electorate that have been forced to make redundancies or, worse, to close as a result of contracts going east?
Mr F. LOGAN replied:
When I became the Minister for Emergency Services, the development of tenders for two of those contracts was still on foot, and they were two years’ old then and had not been resolved. We have been working to resolve them as quickly as we possibly can with the proviso that we would like to see all vehicles manufactured in Western Australia. Bearing in mind all the obligations that we are under, we would like all those vehicles to be manufactured in Western Australia.
I assure the member that as soon as those contracts are announced, he will know exactly who has got them.
