THE State Government is set to renegotiate Roe 8 contracts so workers tied to the $440m project can begin work on Labor’s pre-election transport promises.
Speaking today, Transport Minister Rita Saffioti said the Government would seek “value for money components” tied into the original $440 million dollar project proposed to extend Roe Highway to Stock Road and to secure employment for hundreds of workers.
“Ultimately we want to vary the contract,” she said.
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READ NOW“It’s happened before. We want to vary it but we have specifically stated we want the value for money components and as part of those negotiations a lot of the unit costs that were built into the original contracts would be built into this one.”
Pre-election promises from Labor included the $166m Armadale flyover bridge linking North Lake Road to Armadale Road.
Ms Saffioti would not say which projects were being considered.
“What we’ve tried to identify are those projects we believe are most shovel ready so there’s a continuous workforce,” she said.
“They are at varying degrees of readiness.”
“What we want to do is sit down with contractors over the next two or three weeks and try and get an outcome that gives us value for money and the continued workforce.”
On radio this morning, Premier Mark McGowan believed scrapping Roe 8 could cost the tax payers about $50m.
Ms Saffioti hoped negotiating new work would soften exit costs.
“What we would like to see is elements of that workforce switch to other projects that would minimise the exit cost and have a continued employment for the workforce,” she said.
“That’s the strategy.”
Ms Saffioti said any deal would be subject to it offering value for money.