The NSW government has set new standards in tendering by mandating ongoing consultation with local Aboriginal people over a new public square in western Sydney’s Bradfield City and giving Indigenous considerations a hefty 20 per cent weighting in the final decision.

Judges will select one of five designs for the two-hectare public park by the end of next month following a process that not only required short-listed bidders to tour the site with traditional owners, but to also present their designs and get feedback from them four weeks before the final submission of designs.