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Public Procurement Tenders

Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 16 January 2013

Wednesday, 16 January 2013

Questions (359)

Michael Healy-Rae

Question:

359. Deputy Michael Healy-Rae asked the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform his views on correspondence (details supplied) regarding the centralised buying of goods; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [1266/13]

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Written answers

The Public Service Reform Plan published my Department in November 2011 identified procurement reform as a key instrument that can assist in maintaining the delivery of public services in an efficient manner.

The National Procurement Service (NPS) has put in place a number of national arrangements designed to secure better value for money from leveraging the public service’s buying power in relation to a range of goods and services that are commonly purchased across the public service. These national arrangements have benefits that include: cash savings; administrative savings from reduced duplication of tendering; greater purchasing expertise; improved consistency; and enhanced service levels. In order to increase the usage of the NPS arrangements and thereby secure best value for money, the Government decided that it should be mandatory for public service bodies to use specified national procurement arrangements. The categories subject to national procurement arrangements include: electricity; natural gas; stationery and office supplies; paper; ICT consumables; managed print services; print media advertising; and, motor vehicles. These national arrangements will secure best value for money and facilitate contracting authorities to maintain the delivery of services in the context of tighter budgetary constraints.

While the key reasons for reforming public purchasing is to enable the State to do more with less by aggregating procurement to secure better value for money, it is worth noting that such aggregation arrangements can be implemented in a manner that achieves value for money with a minimal negative impact, or indeed a positive impact, on SMEs. While a number of the categories of goods and services mandated national arrangements are suited to single supplier it should not be taken that single supplier frameworks are to be accepted as the norm. The greater use where appropriate of multi-supplier frameworks – for example the supply of managed print services- can address local supplier issues while also ensuring ongoing cost competitiveness of the framework itself. Such multi-supplier frameworks can also offer SMEs the opportunity to participate in national level contracts, thereby offering valuable reference work when competing for public procurement contracts in other jurisdictions.

In order to encourage greater SME participation the NPS over the past 3 years has conducted a targeted programme of education for suppliers who wish to learn more about doing business with the Irish Public Service. This programme consists of seminars, workshops and large scale 'meet the buyer' events hosted nationwide. In 2012 the NPS, working with InterTradeIreland, for the first time brought together a number of the lead Government agencies to create a programme of major events for the Island of Ireland. Attendees could also avail of educational seminars on a variety of topics ranging from the technicalities of public service procurement to procedures around consortia-building for SMEs. To date the NPS has facilitated workshops and presented at seminars to over 3,000 SMEs nationwide. Surveys conducted at these events have indicated a high degree of satisfaction among suppliers. Parallel with these events the NPS also works closely with business representative bodies such as ISME and IBEC to provide briefings for their members.

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