On Monday, 24th February, the Procurement Act 2023 will replace existing legislation Public Contracts Regulations 2015.

While most colleagues will not be impacted by the new Act, those who are looking to set up new contracts, suppliers, or who want to buy goods or services they’ve never ordered before, should liaise with Procurement as soon as possible – see below for contact details.

What are the main changes?

The new Act will:

• Provide greater flexibility when designing procurement procedures.
• Introduce a central debarment list which shows excluded or excludable supplier. This may be based on previous poor performance.
• Require KPIs to be published for contracts above a certain value.
• Reduce the ‘Standstill Period’. Currently we cannot enter a contract until 10 days after an issue of a decision notice. This period will be reduced to eight working days.
• Require us to publish all pre-procurement activity, contracts and contract variations to the Government website

What does this mean for our colleagues?

For Procurement Teams:

• Additional publication requirements; and
• Increased scrutiny of spend; but
• Enables teams to tailor their approach to achieve better outcomes.

For colleagues who do not work in Procurement:

• It is essential that colleagues looking to set up new contracts, suppliers or who wish to buy goods or services they’ve never ordered before, liaise with Procurement as soon as possible (please see contacts below)
• The new Act will increase the opportunities to achieve best value for money and generate greater savings
• There will be a broader range of suppliers to choose from and increased scope for innovation.

Contacts:

If you need advice on the above please contact any of the team below:

• Tim Hill: 07385 686242 or Tim.Hill@cht.nhs.uk
• Sohail Khan: 07467 735786 or Sohail.Khan@cht.nhs.uk
• Fran Summerton: 07467 735790 or Fran.Summerton@cht.nhs.uk