Although procurement is so important to contractors, including of guarding services, relatively little is ever said about or by the buyers of services. Hence a panel on day one at the Emergency Services Show 2026 was such a welcome window on the buying side, writes Mark Rowe.
Procurement by the public sector matters not only for the sheer billions in contracts each year, but for the potential ends of procurement. The Procurement Act 2023 had the stated ambition of making it easier for small and medium enterprises (SMEs) to bid for public sector contract work, while the Labour Government since has announced it wants โsocial valueโ, contracts to bring benefits to local communities (though how to define โlocalโ?), besides giving value for money and a service of quality. The Act, however, the panel suggested, has in fact meant โmore administration burdenโ, which is both of questionable benefit to the contracting authorities, and leaves SMEs at a disadvantage if they have to hire someone to do the admin, which larger contractors are better placed to handle.
Input or outcome?
Should a contract be specified in terms of input, or outcome? Thereโs no right or wrong answer, the audience at the show at the NEC heard. The procurement team may have to draw on specialists inside their organisation, for the details of whatโs in the specification. The more complex the spec, the more those procuring may seek input from the market. Nor, it seems, should those procuring be afraid of โclarification questionsโ โ at the very least, to get a request for clarification implies that someone is reading the tender!? No-one, the panel stated, has ever written the perfect specification.
Time
Time matters not only because the procuring organisation typically will want the service to start โa week next Tuesdayโ. Yet it takes time for a contractor to get a price-scale right; to complete a bid. If the procurer wants โa solid responseโ, might they leave a tender out for six weeks, or even three or four months? On the other hand, a public body can be โagileโ (in the jargon) in the case of a threat to life โ due to a flood or wildfire โ and a service is sought immediately. The rules allow for a public body under a โprotected timescaleโ (in the jargon) to procure a service as a result of a purchase order, or a โphone call.
Contract management
While organisations may internally regard their procurement team or manager as someone that puts barriers in the way of getting things done, insisting on dotting Is, the panel did make the point that procurement should be part of contract management. That does imply, reading the contract (no matter how tedious) so as to know whatโs being paid for. How else to hold a supplier to account, without knowing the termination clauses, the escalation routes? For one thing, procurement may arise from the need to resolve a problem; yet technology is changing so fast, there may be a new way to do so, cost-effectively; and it may be of value to go out again to the market. That 2023 Act does mean that some public sector contracts are under the 2023 rules, some pre-2023, which can be difficult even for the procurement professionals to follow.
The Emergency Services Show next runs at the NEC on October 6 and 7, 2027. Visit https://www.emergencyuk.com/.
