Procurement
The new UK Procurement Bill: is the NHS ready?
A key objective of the new UK Procurement Bill is to promote transparency, competition and sustainable procurement. Mark Roberts, UK Public Sector Director at Jaggaer, outlines what the bill will mean for the NHS and provides an overview of the key challenges ahead.
After an initial setback in October, the UK Procurement Bill came into force on 24 February. The bill is set to “improve and streamline the way procurement is done and benefit prospective suppliers of all sizes, particularly small businesses, start-ups and social enterprises”,1 by changing the rules that shape how public bodies buy goods and services. Across the Public Sector and within the NHS commercial procurement teams will be busy working to operationalise the bill into existing procedures. This article looks at how different NHS bodies and entities may tackle the change, how they can leverage technology and automation to help seamlessly operationalise the bill into their existing procedures, and the challenges they may face. Currently, NHS procurement is regulated by the Health Care Services (Provider Selection Regime) Regulations 2023 (PSR 2023) and the Public Procurement Contracts Regulation (PCR) 2015. The former are a set of bespoke procurement regulations covering procurement of certain healthcare services in England (excluding Wales). The scope of these services covers those delivered to patients and users by relevant authorities. The Provider Selection Regime (PSR) is applicable to NHS England, Integrated care boards (ICBs), NHS Trusts and NHS Foundation Trusts, local authorities and combined authorities. The new Procurement Act will not apply to services properly under the scope of PSR 2023 but will cover all other goods, services, and works purchased by said relevant authorities, such as Trusts. The onus will be on contracting authorities to ensure whether their purchases will fall under the Procurement Act or the
PSR 2023. The new act will therefore apply to the procurement of all goods and services outside the scope of PSR, delivered by relevant authorities that are out of scope for the PSR, such as facilities management and estates services, including cleaning, catering, consultancy and more. An exception are services that are part of a mixed procurement covered by the PSR. The Procurement Act also applies to the procurement of healthcare services when purchased by public bodies and organisations that are not listed as authorities under the PSR.2 As the UK separated from EU Public Contract
Regulations 2015, the introduction of new legislation under the Procurement Act 2023 offered an opportunity to overhaul previous policies. The Procurement Act 2023 was made
Procurement will need to take into account other value-enhancing factors such as carbon footprint, diversity, contribution to local communities and overall social value.
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law on 27 October 2023, but pending a change in government, its entry into force was postponed to 24 February and the publication of the National Procurement Policy Statement. A key objective of the new bill is to promote
transparency, competition and sustainable procurement, broadening the supplier pool for the NHS to include SMEs, local, diverse and sustainable businesses. This principle will inform a new way of assessing suppliers and their value, which was traditionally based on the MEAT (Most Economically Advantageous Tender) principle and will now shift to selection on the MAT (Most Advantageous Tender) model. While previously the leading principle for selection between otherwise equal proposals was the financial cost-based element, now procurement will need to take into account other value- enhancing factors such as carbon footprint, diversity, contribution to local communities and overall social value. The focus on transparency will derive from
the more open and inclusive procurement process and thus includes greater reporting of results to the Cabinet Office and making
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