Competition lawyer Graeme Young has said that creating government procurement review bodies could help improve both the quality and consistency of procurement practices into public sector contract awards.
Young, a partner in the European Union and competition group at legal firm Dundas & Wilson, said that a review board or administrative tribunal could be used by unsuccessful bidders for contracts.
He said that processes have been criticised for being too long and too complicated, but that introducing an efficient review body ‘might be more effective at driving the right behaviour’.
In other EU countries review boards exist and are used thousands of times a year. In Germany, specialised procurement review bodies make a decision within five weeks while, in France, appeals by unsuccessful bidders can be made to local administrative courts and judges undertake a review within 20 days. The German body is used more than 1000 times a year and France’s more than 5000 times. Young compared these systems to the UK where the only choice is to seek a judicial review.
