Craig Innes, head of commercial and procurement shared services across the councils, said that by increasing purchasing volumes he hopes the councils' primary contractors, who are traditionally based outside the area, will increase their business with local firms.

"What we're trying to do is to grow and develop that local supply chain, so that they [local firms] can be more competitive in engaging with the prime suppliers that come in," he said.

He added that where prime suppliers may once have thought the volumes were not worth the investment of setting up a local base, now "they're looking at things differently and thinking, 'Well, we could be tripling our volumes here'."

A business case setting out the plan, which aims to save £24m ($26.27m) over the next five years on a collective annual spend of around £1bn ($1.09bn), was approved by each individual council’s resources and management committee.

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