Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 26 October 2016
100. Deputy Dara Calleary asked the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform if a regulatory impact assessment was carried out by his Department or the Office of Government Procurement, OGP, on the 2014 EU procurement directives; when this will be published; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [32221/16]
Amharc ar fhreagraAt the end of March 2014, following extensive negotiations over three years, the Official Journal of the European Union (OJEU) published three new procurement directives. The new Directives are:
- Public Procurement: Directive 2014/24/EU on public procurement, which repealed Directive 2004/18/EC
- Utilities: Directive 2014/25/EU on procurement by entities operating in the water, energy, transport and postal services sectors, which repealed Directive 2004/17/EC and
- Concessions: Directive 2014/23/EU on the award of Concession Contracts, which does not directly replace any previous Directive.
The European Commission published several comprehensive impact assessments in relation to public procurement prior to the revision of the EU public procurement regime in 2014 including an Evaluation Report on Impact and Effectiveness of EU Public Procurement which can be found at http://ec.europa.eu/internal_market/publicprocurement/docs/modernising_rules/er853_1_en.pdf.
As part of the transposition process, the Office of Government Procurement conducted both internal and public consultation processes. Most of the provisions of the Directives were mandatory for Ireland to transpose into national law but there were some areas where the Directives permitted policy choices and these were the focus of this consultation. The public consultation process was initiated at the end of October 2014 and 43 submissions were received by the end January 2015, including submissions by representative bodies such as ICTU, IBEC, ISME and the CIF.
The Directives were transposed by Statutory Instrument and adhered as closely as possible to the wording and intent across the Directives to provide maximum flexibility for procurers. The principal approach to transposing the new procurement regime was to retain the flexibilities provided for in the Directives in order to ensure that Ireland was not disadvantaged in any aspect of public procurement relative to other Member States.
The transposition of the public procurement and utilities Directives into Irish law was completed on 5 May 2016 by SI 284 of 2016 Award of Public Authority Contracts Regulations and SI 286 of 2016 Award of Contracts by Utility Undertakings Regulations. The Concessions Directive establishes a new regime for concession type contracts so the transposition process has taken longer. It is intended that transposition will be completed by end 2016.
