Part of 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 1:31 pm on 21 May 2019.
I thank Mike Hedges for that supplementary question. I agree with his first proposition, but, of course, we look to contracts being broken up. That's what the joint bidding guide that the Welsh Government has produced advises large contracts to do, to break up those contracts, and, at the moment, 31 per cent of all contracts advertised on Sell2Wales last year were suitable for joint bids in that way. So, while there are large contracts, I agree with what Mike Hedges said about breaking them up so that they can be small enough for local firms to tender.
Of course, many public sector contracts, Llywydd, are below the Official Journal of the European Community level in any case, and it's the OJEC level where joint bids are encouraged. We require all contracts worth over £25,000 to be advertised on Sell2Wales. Eighty per cent of all those contracts are below the OJEC level, and those contracts are more attractive to smaller and local firms. Of course, we are keen to support large Welsh firms as well. In the construction sector, 76 per cent of contracts or frameworks of over £0.25 million or more were awarded to Welsh contractors last year.