Eoghan Murphy (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

This is a matter that the Chairman has consistently raised during the six years that I have been a Member of Dáil Éireann and for the three years I served on the Committee of Public Accounts, when he was Chairman of it, during which time we examined the issue in detail. Having now had responsibility for a year for the Office of Government Procurement, what we have been trying to do is to refocus the office in a few ways. Certainly, this item of reform in terms of the €12 billion plus that is spent annually by the Government on procuring goods and services involves a huge budget. We need to bring together our expertise into a central location and we need to bring transparency and accountability to the way that goods and services are being procured by Government.

That was a big piece of work that has been under way for a number of years. It happened at the beginning of the recession, and began in 2010. It led to the new office being set up in the past couple of years. The focus has always been on saving money for the taxpayer and delivering value for money. Now we are very much in a space of ensuring that in meeting those objectives we do not undermine the ability of Irish SMEs to win tenders for Government business while recognising that we are in a Single Market. Whenever we introduce a protocol or bring a regulation into effect we try to ensure we do it in a way that does not undermine Irish companies and does not open us to a legal challenge from other entities in Europe, for example. In that, the Single Market is of benefit to us because statistics show that Irish companies have won more in other European jurisdictions than other European companies have won in Ireland. We will discuss this matter a bit later.

In the next couple of weeks I shall announce a couple of initiatives around SMEs in particular. For the past year I have chaired quarterly meetings of our advisory group on small and medium-sized enterprises on which all of the main bodies are represented, including the Small Firms Association, the Construction Industry Federation and IBEC. We have tried to improve the process whereby an SME can tender with a view to reducing the red tape involved but also getting better understanding out into the market when the Government is about to go to tender. If a tender framework is about to be put in place then businesses in the industry will be notified. They will be asked to submit their views on the criteria to be applied and how they might work. A number of steps will be taken before a framework is opened up and put in place.

The Office of Government Procurement, OGP, has four regional locations and we have started to take the office into constituencies. Deputies and Senators are very much in contact with local businesses and small businesses. We invite them along to open seminars to explain what the OGP seeks to achieve and, likewise, they can give feedback on what we do. Whenever one reforms something and makes a change one must review to check whether one has achieved one's aim and made an impact or if the initiative needs to be reformed even further.