Agenda and draft minutes

Apologies for absence were received from Mr Lorenzo and Councillor Scobie.

To receive any declarations of interest.  Members are advised to consider the advice contained within the Declaration of Interest advice attached to this Agenda.  If a Member declares an interest, they should complete the Declaration of Interest Form 

There were no declarations of interest.

Gemma Paul, Procurement Manager, introduced and outlined the report. The following key points were made:

·  The Procurement Act 2023 introduced a new statutory regime in relation to public procurement and replaced previous legislation. The Contract Standing Orders (CSOs) had been re-drafted to reflect the requirements of The Procurement Act 2023 and would be formally known as Contract Procedure Rules (CPRs).

·  There were new rules relating to ‘below threshold procurements’, which impacted the greatest proportion of TDC’s procurement activity.

·  The Contract Procedure Rules (CPRs) would be subject to further review in 6 to 9 months.

Further to questions and comments from Members, it was noted:

·  The CPRs gave TDC more flexibility to break contracts up into smaller pieces and where this was not possible, reasons would be given in transparency notices. The regulated process would open up more conversations and reduce barriers to participation with small/medium business and social enterprise.

·  The CPRs increased transparency, allowing tracking throughout the process from planning stages to award of contract, any modifications, quality of delivery and expiry/termination.

·  There was a transition period from the previous CSOs. Frameworks and dynamic purchasing systems were still available procured under the previous CSOs. Work was being undertaken with projects that had not developed project strategies.

·  New procurement had to be compliant with the new CPRs but this should not prejudice or cause any delays to processes.

It was proposed by Councillor Pugh, seconded by Councillor Austin and Members AGREED:

To recommend that Full Council: Approve the new Contract Procedure Rules which are attached to the agenda report at Annex 1.