Member for Bathurst Paul Toole is expecting a decision to be made on the location for the headquarters – which the NSW Government has said will be in regional NSW – in the next couple of months.

And Mr Toole has a spot in mind: a site adjacent to Bathurst TAFE on Panorama Avenue that has been set aside for a technology park. 

NSW Minister for Skills John Barilaro last week announced what he said was a once-in-a-generation reform to the TAFE system.

He said 10 separate institutes within TAFE would be merged into a single body to save money spent on administration and under-utilised properties would be sold and the proceeds reinvested into the organisation.

As part of the changes, he announced that a new TAFE digital education headquarters would be created in regional NSW.

“I have certainly put Bathurst forward [as a location for the headquarters] and I will continue to lobby the minister [Mr Barilaro],” Mr Toole said on Monday.

He said technology had made decentralisation easier.

“We don't need, when it comes to technology, to have things based in Sydney,” he said.

“They can be run just as effectively, if not more effectively, in western NSW.”

Mr Toole said his understanding, having spoken to the minister, was that the headquarters, which will develop and deliver TAFE digital programs and courses, would employ up to 60 people.

He said Bathurst, as a regional education hub, would be an ideal location, and the site on Panorama Avenue would be an ideal site.

Bathurst Regional Council bought a 10,000 square metre site between Land and Property Information and the Bathurst TAFE site about four years ago for future development as a technology park.

Bathurst’s bid for the headquarters has also been given a boost from an unlikely source: Orange.

Speaking to ABC Central West last week, Orange City councillor Red Kidd said while Orange would be his preference to host the facility, he wouldn’t be disappointed if Bathurst got the headquarters.

Shadow Skills Minister Prue Car has criticised the TAFE centralisation as a move towards further cost-cutting.