Public Procurement Action Plan (Northern Ireland)

The Department of Finance & Personnel have recently released their response to the Assembly's Inquiry into public procurement in Northern Ireland. The Response outlines how the Department will address many of the reccommendation made by the Assembly Committee in it's report.

Public Procurement & Social enterprises

The NI Assembly recently published a Report on its Inquiry into Public Procurement in Northern Ireland:

http://www.niassembly.gov.uk/finance/2007mandate/reports/Report_19_08_09R.htm

The Committee for Finance & Personnel have made a number of recommendations which will be of interest to social enterprises engaged in the public procurement process.

Indeed the Committee states that implementation of the recommendations will achieve the objective of developing the social economy in Northern Ireland.

One of the more interesting recommendations is the support for the establishment of a public procurement brokerage service for social enterprises as advocated by the Ulster Community Investment Trust (Para 174).

As most social enterprises are small in scale it can be extremely difficult to break into the complex area of public procurement. The brokerage service seeks to address the key resource and knowledge limitations by offering professional support for the tendering of contracts. It is certainly a service that social enterprises should be watching out for in the year ahead.