ACT Property Group director Daniel Bailey said the Canberra group LEAD, which provides job opportunities for people with disabilities, had been operating the much-loved landmark in Petrie Plaza since September last year in a trial.

Mr Bailey said for the previous 19 years, the merry-go-round had been under private management before it was handed back to the ACT Property Group last year.

''We wanted to trial something different,'' he said.

LEAD had been operating the merry-go-round on an arrangement of taking 50 per cent of the proceeds while the government took the other half and continued to be responsible for its maintenance.

Eighteen people had been employed over the period including eight on a permanent basis and 15 people with disabilities.

The government wanted to continue the arrangement of the merry-go-round being run by an operator that made some contribution to the community.

Mr Bailey said the contract would be tendered later this month, open to ''social enterprises'' - which might be for profit or not-for-profit groups that sought a social as well as financial return on their investment.

He said there was no issue with how LEAD had run the merry-go-round and the trial had in fact shown the arrangement worked.

''We don't want to preclude them, we actually encourage them to go for the next one, but we also want to allow any other social enterprise to tender for this next one. So it'll be openly advertised, targeting social enterprises,'' he said.

LEAD chief executive officer Keryl Neville said the organisation understood the contract would eventually be opened to tender and it would consider applying.

''The people who worked there certainly enjoyed it,'' she said.

And while Chief Minister Katy Gallagher has mused about moving the merry-go-round to a busier location, Mr Bailey said that wasn't on the cards.

''No, there's definitely no plans to relocate it. It's staying there. And we're doing a fair bit of restoration work on it, the structure around it; fixing the canopy up over time,'' he said.

Next year will also be a big anniversary for the merry-go-round. It will be 40 years since it started operating in Canberra and 100 years since it started operating at the St Kilda Esplanade in Melbourne.

The merry-go-round was bought for $40,000 for the people of Canberra in 1973 and started operating in the national capital the following year.