Written answers

Tuesday, 3 November 2020

Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine

Departmental Contracts

Photo of Seán SherlockSeán Sherlock (Cork East, Labour)
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1531. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the number of contracts approved in his Department in 2019 and to date in 2020 without competitive tender; the details of the contract; the company awarded the contract; and the full value of the contract in tabular form. [33265/20]

Photo of Charlie McConalogueCharlie McConalogue (Donegal, Fianna Fail)
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My Department ensures that there is an appropriate focus on good practice in procurement and that procedures are in place to ensure compliance with relevant guidelines and legislation.

EU and national rules promote an open, competitive and non-discriminatory public procurement regime which delivers value for money. EU Directives declare that there can be legitimate reasons for awarding contracts non-competitively, such as extreme urgency brought about by unforeseeable events or if there is a single supplier to perform the contract. Therefore, a non-competitive procurement is not necessarily non-compliant with procurement rules.

Circular 40/02 issued by the Department of Finance requires my Department to report all contracts above €25,000 (exclusive of VAT) awarded without a competitive process to the Comptroller and Auditor General (C&AG) by 31 March of the following year.

In 2019, 98 contracts with a value of €14,283,712 were awarded without a competitive process and declared on the Circular 40/02 return as expenditure against those contracts exceeded the reporting threshold of €25,000.

Of this, contracts valued at €10,489,674 were undertaken without a competitive process but are considered compliant, as the justification for awarding these contracts without a competitive process falls within the exceptions to open/competitive procurement permitted in national and EU legislation.

The remaining procurement with a value of €3,794,038 was also undertaken without a competitive process but is not considered compliant as the contracts were not subject to an independent review prior to the award of the contract.

The 2019 information is not readily available in the format requested. Officials in my Department will collate the information and forward it directly to the Deputy. Information on 2020 non-competitive procurement will not be available until 2021.

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