Mount Beauty-based Helen Mathew’s submission to a Victorian parliamentary inquiry says the process was weighed down by bureaucracy and ignored local expertise.

Her submission was one of 51 received by the inquiry, including the complaints of Chiltern Primary school revealed by The Border Mail yesterday.

The school is waiting for its new $800,000 library.

But more than a year after the Building the Education Revolution funding was announced, it has little more than a muddy work site.

Yesterday Ms Mathew, now acting as principal consultant on another Building the Education Revolution project, declined to comment on her submission.

But her official contribution said there was unnecessary paperwork, the process limited access to builders and discriminated against the use of “locals” in the billions of dollars worth of projects.

Opposition member for Indi Sophie Mirabella fears Ms Mathew and the school’s complaint are the tip of the iceberg.

“I have been hearing these stories for months but people are afraid to speak out publicly for fear of being punished,” she said.

“Building a school library is not rocket science and this project should have been near completion by this stage.

“The problem with this program is that it treats parents and school communities with contempt.

“There was no consultation and no engagement with the schools.

“It was just a slap dash case of one size fits all.

“Obviously each school has different needs.

“We believe that the local school communities are in the best position to manage these projects — not some bureaucrat or politician sitting in Canberra.”

Yesterday, Chiltern Primary school council president Debbie Summerfield said their criticisms were targeted at the process, not the outcome.

“The end result will be a great bonus for the school,” she said.

“But we have lost a classroom for nine months while this project got bogged down in red tape.”

She said a nearby Catholic school had been given the money and power to run a project that met their own needs.

That project has already been completed.