Helping Local Win

I thoroughly enjoy my ‘hi vis’ industry adventures at Industry Capability Network - Victoria , and my reports of these visits use the sign off hashtag “helplocalwin”.

What does "helplocalwin" mean and why is it important?

Put simply, it means highlighting and helping Victorian capability (products and services) to connect with projects and buyers.

Given we are still recovering from the pandemic disruptions, with supply chain issues including sourcing local materials, skills and workforce, it is topical and important for industry.

?It is also important because there is scope for Victoria to use procurement as a lever to address some of the broader economic and social challenges we face now and in future.

How do we help local firms?

Last year our team worked on over 10,000 projects, we interacted with thousands of firms competing for work packages associated with projects, completing Local Industry Development Plans, many of which were awarded tenders and helped to build local capability.

Some positive outcomes for local firms include these case studies:

• Viridian Glass Australia – our Geelong Industry Adviser, Peter McCracken was able to help connect local firm, Viridian Glass to the Geelong Performing Arts Centre project, which resulted in their successful tender and onshoring of this aspect of the project. View LinkedIn post here.
• Digital Ding Trams ‘win’ - in liaising with TTM Rail as part of our capability research, we connected with this local firm developing a digital solution for the conventional Melbourne tram bell and have been able to help them with visibility and access to projects. Here is a video featuring the Minister testing the bell: View video here.
• I recently participated in a roundtable at 澳大利亚维多利亚大学 designed to resolve skills development challenges. I was proud to represent industry around a table with people who will make a difference to future vocational education outcomes, and I am hopeful that through the recent reviews (Macklin and Firth) and our new Victorian Skills Plan, industry will be in a strong position to invest in skills for the future.

Supportive policies?

The Victorian Government has been strongly committed to policies supporting local industry linked with procurement over many years. These include Local Jobs First, the Social Procurement Framework and now, the Building Equality Policy. These policies align with the current focus on locally sourced materials, locally developed skills as well as safe participation in the workforce.

Local Jobs First has seen 25K jobs created and retained over the past five years. In addition, the Major Procurement Skills Guarantee is applied to projects over $20M with 10% estimated labour hours allocated to apprentices, trainees, and cadets.

The policies also go beyond ‘value for money’ being just about dollar value. They aim for innovation, inclusivity, and sustainability outcomes from procurement.?

Our team is proud to help implement these policies to achieve positive outcomes for local capabilities and communities. Using both administration and connection roles, we can help make procurement processes easier to navigate and hopefully with success for local firms.

This work helps to activate and unearth opportunities for local firms, social and sustainable products and services, skills, and labour.

Let’s be frank, these policies do create additional requirements for local firms and compliance obligations. Yet, the benefits far outweigh the additional work, and we see many positive case studies where a local solution has been found or a local firm has been given a full and fair opportunity to compete.

Also, using data collected, we can all benefit from the gained insights about local capability across all sectors. We use these insights to guide future tender specifications, and transfer them to other sectors, we also advise procuring managers (public and private) on future projects.

There are many opportunities, and it is such worthy work. I am proud to say I connect with the ICN purpose to #helplocalwin and this defines why we exist.

Finally – on local steel

As mentioned, part of our work is advice on Local Industry Development Plans (LIDP) for Victoria’s major projects. Recently, we have been involved in implementing recent enhancements to the Local Jobs First policy to encourage the use of local steel.

Local steel is an excellent representation or litmus test for local manufacturing.

Strong use of local steel = strong local manufacturing.

Yet supply chain and other challenges associated with using local steel are well known.

Now, new provisions applying to project contractors requires that they must be more specific about their steel commitments in their LIDPs, plus the identification and justification of any proposed variations and changes to these local steel commitments. The guidelines and fact sheets accompanying local Steel commitments can be found here.

It means that we keep the prospect of a local steel supply opportunity alive, which in turn helps local manufacturing.

I cannot overstate how eager we are to help local firms work through any changes as well as challenges.

And these changes are aligned with our purpose, to “helplocalwin”.

I look forward to continuing to highlight and help Victorian capability and strengthen industry with benefits for all Victorians.

#helplocalwin #localjobsfirst #socialprocurement #buildingequality #localjobsfirst