Treasury Board President Peter Bethlenfalvy announced the government of Ontario intends to centralize all provincial procurements in an effort to save the public money.

On March 20, Bethlenfalvy tweeted centralizing government procurement will save $1 billion a year, make it easier and more efficient to deliver services to the people, and allow the province to invest in other core public services like healthcare and education.

In his press release on Monday, Bethlenfalvy said there would be interim measures, such as the limiting of long-term contracts during the building of a centralized system. The province will also hire consulting services to support the development of a centralized procurement system.

“Currently there is far too much duplication and fragmentation in the system. We are not taking advantage of our shared buying power to drive efficiencies and cost savings,” Bethlenfalvy told CP24.