Ms Anne Stewart:

Yes. Applicants must declare that. In the case of the Spanish issue, the challenge we have with European procurement law is that we cannot exclude a tenderer unless there has been a final judgment. In the case of the Spanish companies, they have appealed the process. While the case is going through the appeal process, it is open to those companies to continue to bid for contracts and to win them. This is because public authorities cannot exclude them on the grounds that the final judgment has not fully come through or been activated. This is a real struggle for procurement teams.

Regarding the current tenders going through and that some of these companies are bidding for, I cannot comment too much on them because these competitions are not run by the OGP. Many of them are, instead, run by the NDFA. I have, though, communicated with that agency and what it has told us is that it is applying due diligence and has sought legal advice, and for now, because there has been no final judgment in the Spanish case, the tender process will be managed as normal.