Pearse Doherty (Donegal South West, Sinn Fein)
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81. To ask the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform if any study has been completed by his Department on the impact on local economies of the centralisation of procurement currently carried out by local authorities; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [26445/15]

Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour)
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Public Procurement is governed by the EU Treaty, EU Directives, Regulations and national guidelines. These set down rules whereby contracting authorities must award contracts under procedures designed to achieve value for public money in an open, transparent and non discriminatory competitive process. Contracting authorities are precluded from awarding contracts to a company simply on the basis of geographical location.

There is no specific study completed by my Department on the impact on local economies of the centralisation of procurement, currently carried out by local authorities.  Instead the Office of Government Procurement has established Category Councils to develop category-specific strategies that seek to establish the best commercial approach to the supply market that balances the need to achieve value for the money for the State with other objectives such as supply market sustainability, and other Government Policy objectives. The content of these strategies will vary depending upon the nature of the goods and services required.  The frameworks the OGP is putting in place typically breakdown customer requirements by lots against which suppliers can bid.  Lots may be based on goods or services descriptions, usage patterns, size and nature of customer demand and/or geographical location.  The lotting arrangements are determined by the sourcing strategy and consider customer requirements and market supply factors. 

The recently published report by the Office of Government Procurement (OGP) "Public Service Spend and Tendering Analysis for 2013" showed that 93% of public service procurement expenditure was with businesses in the Republic of Ireland. This was based on an analysis of €2.742 billion expenditure across 64 large public service bodies involving over 35,000 suppliers. The Office of Government Procurement will continue to work with industry to ensure that winning government business is done in a fair, transparent and accessible way and to ensure that government procurement policies are business friendly.