Procurement Reform Roadshow - Norwich 10th October 2023 and Liverpool 12th October

 The first roadshow for buyers went very well in Newcastle.

We are looking forward to 2 more next week on Tuesday 10th October 2023 in Norwich and Thursday 12th October in Liverpool.

Full details here.

After these 2 with me acting a Master of Ceremonies, and further events follow in Birmingham, Nottingham, Sheffield and Bristol MC'd by my colleague Gemma.

After that we turn to running events for suppliers in November on 22nd in Manchester and 23rd in London.  Details here.

Hope to see you at these events.

Public Procurement in the UK - online 2021

 With a colleague we are looking at running a public procurement awareness course in March 2022, just ahead of the implementation of new public procurement rules (or so we are told).

Our current plans would be to look at doing one day as an Introduction, and a second day focusing on the new regulations.

A possible third day would be a course I have longed to do for years, which is to look at negotiation from both the sales and procurement points of view- at the same time.

If you are interested, it would be great if you would let me know  - no commitment.  What we want to know is whether it is of interest, and what topics people want covering.

Hope to see you then.

Further Public Contracts Regulations 2015 courses

My colleagues at BIP Solutions have got just a few more courses to run before we have a bit of a break for the summer.  The Autumn is pretty packed for me both in the UK and overseas, so I am reasonably pleased that we have a time to regroup before then . We shall be tweaking the courses as we become clearer about the new PCR2015, and what people want to know about it.

In the meantime I shall be presenting the existing (and already modified) event in Manchester next Tuesday 23rd June 2015 at the Marriott Renaissance - details here.  Last time we ran this event in Manchester it sold out - so I hope there will still be room for you if you want to go along.  We always take a few extra copies just in case.

The next day (Wednesday 26th June 2015) I shall be running the event at the Thistle in Newcastle Upon Tyne, and then that will be it for me for open courses in June.  One of my colleagues will be running the event in London on the 25th (at the very nice Kingsway hotel)

Questions raised by the new Public Contracts Regulations 2015

We (at BIP Solutions) have run a few of our courses about the impact of the new regulations, and have had some great questions from the delegates.  Most of which we could answer - but a couple we have had to dig into before we could give a full answer.  Which is great - because now we can tell anyone who is interested.

As I have said before, it takes time for new regulations to be bedded in and for people to understand what there is between the cracks.  Of course eventually we shall have case law, derived from challenges, but that could be a year or two away yet.

The questions include;
- When do we have to move to full electronic tendering?
- Do we need to advertise our tenders on Contracts Finder?
- as a consultancy/agency do only our fees count towards the OJEU limit?
- Do we need to have all our documentation available when we publish our Contract Notice?

Good questions all.  And if you want to know the answers, why not come along to one of our events in the next couple of months.  A few of the dates have been rearranged and others added but there should be an event (relatively) near you unless you live in Scotland (where the new PCRs have not yet been adopted).  Details are here.

UK Public Procurement - change is coming

Just a reminder that Francis Maude is standing down at the election in 2 weeks, and so there will be changes at the Cabinet Office, and therefore potentially throughout public sector procurement in England (at least).   His swansong will have been the requirement for all contracts below the OJEU threshold but above £10 000 (Central government) or £25 000 (sub-central government) to be conducted using a single stage open process (i.e. no PQQ stage).    I have wittered on before about how I am far from convinced that this is a good idea (especially for Buyers, but also for suppliers) so let's leave it there.

Mr Maude spent a long time at Cabinet Office, and was notably interested in Procurement as a tool for government policy.  His replacement, of whatever political flavour, may share his zeal - or just see it as a stepping stone to a "real" job at HM Treasury.  Whichever, we need to be on the look out for any indicated change of direction.

Not least of all because (as again pointed out by Peter Smith and SpendMatters) Contracting Authorities have an obligation under the Small Business, Enterprise and Employment Act 2015
 to "have regard to any guidance for the time being in force under this section".

So don't forget to keep reading the PPNs (Procurement Policy Notes) from the Cabinet Office.

New Public Contract regulations - other blogs

On Wednesday I ran my first event of the PASS  series of Impact of the New Public Contracts Regulations 2015.  Not as especially catchy title, but as one of the delegates said "it's not something we want to know about, it's something we need to know about".

Very interesting session with very knowledgeable and engaged delegates, two of whom were good enough to give me a lift to the station because I over ran.

If you want some additional information, a pair of law lecturers from Swansea and Leicester are going through the regulations in tandem on their blogs - one per post.  This onerous task (which I discovered from Peter Smith's Spend Matters blog)  will take them until autumn, but it is an interesting exercise for anyone wondering (as I do) where the challenges to the new regulations are going to arise.

The blogs are;

www.telles.eu
www.howtocrackanut.blogspot.co.uk