This week I announced important changes that will improve the way taxpayer’s money is spent and reduce the over-reliance on consultants.

In the last five years of the previous Liberal Government more than 10,000 contracts were issued to consultants - costing taxpayers $1 billion. This is a rate of 1 engagement every working hour for 5 years straight.

This overreliance on consultants has directly contributed to the budget mess we inherited. For example, a single job with an external consultant can cost up to taxpayers twice as much as using the internal resources of the NSW public service.

That’s why my Government is focused on ensuring that we rebuild in-house capability within the NSW public service and only use external consultants when it’s actually needed.

We have implemented tight controls and issued clear instructions to agencies around the use of external consultants.

A new unit will be set up within the Premier’s Department that will redirect agencies to in-house specialist resources where they are available and build in-house capabilities for services with the highest demand.

This has been done to bring costs under control and re-build capacity in the public sector.

My government has also introduced additional probity measures following scandals involving consulting agencies that have come to light over the past 18 months.

The funds we save through these measures will be redirected into essential services like hiring more nurses, building new schools, upgrading roads and providing better public transport.

We are focused on spending taxpayers’ money responsibly - we’d rather invest more into the essential services that our communities rely on.

Yours sincerely,

The Hon. Chris Minns MP
Premier of New South Wales
Member for Kogarah