Agenda item

To present the report of the Director of Function (Resources)/Section 151 Officer.

Councillor Robin Williams, Deputy Leader and Portfolio Member for Finance and Housing presented the report by the Director of Function (Resources)/

Section 151 Officer incorporating the draft Procurement Strategic Plan and Contract Procedure Rules for comment by the committee prior to their submission to the Executive for approval.

The UK Government has revised the legislation in respect of procurement in the public sector and the Procurement Act 2023 will come into force on 24 February 2025.Also, Welsh Government has passed the Social Partnership and Public Procurement (Wales) Act 2023 which places additional responsibilities and duties on public sector organisations in Wales in relation to procurement. The Council commissioned an external company to review the Council’s preparedness for the change in legislation and to provide the Council with an action plan to ensure compliance which covers a number of areas including the overall strategy. The Strategic Plan sets out the Council’s approach to procurement and ensures that the way in which the Council commissions and sources its services, supplies and works is compliant with legislation, internal policies and processes, is ethical, open, fair, transparent and includes economic, social, labour and environmental factors in the process.

The change in procurement legislation required the Council to update its Contract Procedure Rules (CPRs) which set out the process on how to undertake a procurement exercise, the different procurement methods and when they should be used. The revised CPRs have been drafted to ensure they are flexible enough to allow officers to undertake procurement exercises in the most efficient and effective way while still ensuring that any procurement exercise is controlled and ensures that the Council achieves value for money.

The Director of Function (Resources)/Section 151 Officer advised that the Strategic Plan could mean more opportunities to contract with local firms thereby leading to greater local economic benefits.

The subsequent discussion focused on the following points –

• Whether the Council has the capacity to take a more innovative approach to procurement and to seek different solutions and models of delivery including internalising contracts where feasible and using technology to reduce the administrative burden.
• Agreement by members about the importance of contracting with local firms and suppliers thereby increasing the spending that goes into the local economy on Anglesey.
• Whether there is engagement with local businesses and how and where contracts are advertised.

In responding to the points raised, Officers advised as follows –

• That while capacity is a consideration, the Council is committed to innovating where it can within the resources available to it and will explore doing things differently where to do so means increased effectiveness, efficiency and value. The Director of Function (Resources)/ Section 151 Officer cited examples where the Council has internalised contracts but advised that it is not feasible to review all of the Council’s many contracts.
• That local companies can sometimes view private sector work as more advantageous than working for the public sector and need to be persuaded of the benefits of bidding for contracts with the Council. In addition, local firms are not always able to deliver the Council’s contract requirements. The new procurement legislation does allow for flexibility in the way that contracts can be packaged which may make them more attractive to local firms. The Chief Executive advised that while modernising approaches is important, the primary consideration must be ensuring that the Council remains compliant with the legislation and with regulations thereby preserving its reputation.
• That further work needs to be done on initiatives such as meet the buyer events. Council Tax premium revenue was used to engage an officer in the Economic Development service to undertake this type of work and further consideration may have to be given to ways in which the premium can be used to strengthen the local economy the premium having been levied to counter the effects of the rising number of second homes within communities and to help local people buy local homes which will contribute to the local economy. The new procurement legislation requires councils to advertise future pipeline contracts which may also provide an opportunity to engage the interests of local firms early on in the process.

Having scrutinised the draft Procurement Strategic Plan and Contract Procedure Rules, it was resolved to accept the draft Procurement Strategic Plan for 2024- 25 and Contract Procedure Rules and recommend the same to the Executive.