| A Review of Local Government
Procurement in England
Response by the Society of Purchasing Officers
in Local Government
Aligning Procurement and Best Value - Recommendations
1-3
We wholeheartedly endorse these recommendations with the proviso
that it may not be appropriate to involve in-house employees
in the procurement process if they are submitting a competitive
bid in order to protect probity.
Developing a Corporate Procurement Function
- Recommendations 4-6
We endorse these recommendations subject to the proviso that
our proposals for a National Procurement Forum should work with
the Public and Private Sector to build up centres of excellence
available to smaller authorities, as identified in the main
report (page 25 paragraph 2.7) where the reference is that the
LGA should help by bringing together public and private sector
procurement expertise.
Reviewing Current Practice - Recommendations
7-9
We endorse these recommendations but feel that encouragement
should be given to local authorities to join existing or new
consortia arrangements for commonly used items. By encouraging
every authority to set up their own such arrangements the amount
of resource necessary to do this would be diverted away from
attention to more strategically important procurement activity.
Less than 10% of value of local authority purchases are on goods.
Engaging Members - Recommendation 10
We endorse this recommendation and would encourage the use of
the National Procurement Forum to provide opportunity for the
provision of appropriate training. It is, however, vital that
probity is protected and involvement is at a strategic level
only.
Improving Regulations - Recommendations
11-13
We endorse these recommendations and have made contact with
both the Audit Commission and District Audit to offer our support
and help for the work they are currently carrying out linked
to Recommendations 12 and 13. We would also suggest that it
may be appropriate for local authority procurement practitioners
to agree protocols with their audit colleagues on sharing procurement
information.
Building Capability - Recommendations 14-16
We endorse these recommendations and would recommend that funding
should be allocated through a National Procurement Forum to
ensure full delivery of the thrust of the 39 recommendations
in the Report. Our separate note on National Procurement Forum
encourages passing implementation of the recommendations to
such a group with a broad membership.
Using E-Procurement - Recommendation 17
We endorse this recommendation and would ask that it is developed
further so that consistent/central audit advice is provided
to Local Authorities to avoid each procurement practitioner
needing to convince audit colleagues, on an individual authority
basis, of the benefits of simple forms of E-Procurement. There
is significant hype in the e-procurement marketplace and it
is vital that a modular approach is adopted by Local Authorities
in view of the current risks.
Funding Improvement - Recommendations 18
and 19
We endorse these recommendations.
Gathering and Sharing Information - Recommendations
20 and 21
We endorse these recommendations and would encourage the use
of our proposals for a National Procurement Forum to develop
information exchange beyond the proposals currently considered.
Discussing and Resolving Market Issues -
Recommendation 22
Our separate proposals on a joint National Procurement Forum
based on the meeting convened by the Society should be set up
for the reasons identified in that separate part of our submission.
Buying Consortia - Recommendations 23 and
24
Our separate paper addresses these issues but we do not endorse
buying consortia producing annual accounts as many consortia
do not have any financial transactions and are not entities
in their own right. In terms of meeting the needs of smaller
Councils, consideration needs to be given to how this support
would be funded as smaller Councils are often unable to undertake
procurement activity on behalf of others due to capacity.
Designing and Planning a Project - Recommendations
25 and 27
We endorse these recommendations and would again wish for the
Gateway project review process to be agreed through our proposed
National Procurement Forum. Any Gateway process should be evolved,
as a resource intensive process may not be appropriate for the
majority of Local Authorities. However, a number of Local Authorities
are currently trialing scaled-down versions of the Gateway review
process and this learning will be shared through a number of
routes including the Society's Website www.sopo.org.
Rationalisation of Procurement Processes as mentioned in Recommendation
27 will provide significant benefits to both the public and
private sector. The Society of Purchasing Officers will be taking
forward work to develop an appropriate tool to enable Local
Authorities to use a single source of core information on potential
tenderers. All those who attended the national meeting called
by the Society have no alternative proposals and were in agreement
that the Society should take this work forward.
Managing Risk - Recommendations 28 and 29
We endorse these recommendations and would encourage the development
of national good practice advice by the Audit Commission, developed
in partnership with practitioners and others who offer procurement
support in local Government. (see comments on Recommendations
11-13 above)
Assessing Bids - Recommendation 30
Significant efforts will be needed to develop an appropriate
model for all purposes. In some procurements it is necessary
to leave some elements of evaluation less detailed in order
to encourage innovative solutions to local Authority needs.
Contract Management - Recommendations 31-34
We endorse the good practice identified in recommendations 31
and 32 and will welcome any definition of open book and its
use in view of the reluctance of some suppliers to adopt an
open partnering approach in this way. We would encourage our
proposals for a National Procurement Forum to consider the issues
of supplying performance measurement information and the appropriate
confidentiality issues.
Applying and Improving Legislation - Recommendations
35-39
We endorse these recommendations.
Commentary
The Society believes that our proposed National Procurement
Forum, which will bring together those interested in supporting
procurement in local Authorities is the best solution to provide
the necessary help and support to deliver outcomes sought through
the recommendations of the Review of local Government Procurement
in England. We would welcome the opportunity to discuss this
further with the DTLR and LGA.
N.B. We are disappointed to note
that the Annex D does not include the websites of CIPS and SOPO
(www.sopo.org).
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