The government will undertake community and stakeholder consultation sessions in late October to let local businesses know how they can get involved in the site which will eventually house 1000 public servants.

Regional Development Minister Jaala Pulford said the government was keen to ensure local businesses benefited from the mammoth project which will see 600 new public service jobs located in the Ballarat CBD.

“The key focus of the community and stakeholder event will be to provide local business with better knowledge and of how to be part of construction project,” Ms Pulford said.  “It’s a really exciting project for Ballarat and it’s going to transform the city more than any  other single investment.”

Early works at the Civic Hall site began back in July, with construction expected to be completed in 2020.  All 400 existing state government jobs in Ballarat will be relocated to GovHub, with employees from departments and agencies such as Service Victoria, VicRoads and the Department of Environenment, Land, Water and Planning entering the site.

Ms Pulford gave assurance the presence of all eight departments and agencies was permanent and that senior management positions would be among those based at the Civic Hall site. 

Opposition leader Matthew Guy has previously raised concerns around the arrangements of GovHub, arguing that having multiple agencies and departments in the one building would lead to a low-skilled “call centre” environment.

The opposition has maintained its pledge to relocate the VicRoads headquarters to Ballarat should it get elected in 2018.

“We are proposing to create 600 new jobs in Ballarat and I can assure you those jobs are permanent,” Ms Pulford said.