procurement strategy 2005 â€“ updated 2007

Procurement Strategy – v3 1 02-10-07

PROCUREMENT STRATEGY 2005 – updated 2007

CONTENTS

Foreword Introduction

What is Procurement? The Council’s Use of Procurement The Council’s Strategic Objectives Council Spending

Procurement Strategy

Providing Leadership and Building Capacity Partnering and Collaboration Doing Business Electronically Stimulating Markets and Achieving Community Benefits

Summary


FOREWORD

This is the Procurement Strategy for the Kent County Council which states our determination to use procurement as a strategic tool across the organisation. Both Members and Officers are committed to the delivery of effective services for residents and to continue working to make Kent a county where people want to live, work and enjoy themselves. It is recognised that the Council’s procurement of goods, works and services has a major impact on many aspects of life in Kent, including the environment, social factors and the local economic climate. We will continue to seek the maximum benefits from this spending whilst minimising the negative impacts. We are proud to host the South East Centre of Excellence and to benefit from the positive impact it has had on the region’s 74 councils and other public bodies. Peter Gilroy Chief Executive


INTRODUCTION Procurement is a high value activity within the Council that has a critical impact on its performance and success. The Council currently spends over £830m a year on goods, works and services. Procurement in local government is increasingly under the spotlight starting from the Byatt report “Delivering Better Services for Citizens” in 2001 through to the “National Procurement Strategy for Local Government” (NPS) published in October 2003. Procurement across the public sector forms the cornerstone of the government’s Efficiency Agenda and a significant element of the anticipated efficiency savings are attributed to the better use of procurement by councils. Procurement also features heavily in the criteria for assessing councils under the government’s CPA agenda. Early guidance stated: “Procurement is not an end in itself. It should be undertaken to further the strategic objectives of the authority.

Developing a procurement strategy, covering a three to five year period, will enable an authority to develop a longer-term vision of how procurement can help deliver strategic objectives.”

Procurement Essentials – I&DeA 2003 This Strategy sets out the framework within which the Council will work to ensure that this activity fulfils the requirements of the Council across all services* and directly contributes to the achievement of the Council’s corporate aims and objectives. *Schools’ expenditure, due to its devolved budget status, is not explicitly included in this Strategy but neither are there barriers that prevent schools participating to gain the benefits.


This Strategy sets out a number of action plans to further develop the Council’s procurement policies and practices and establish a programme of continuous improvement. It also details the key objectives and promotes a consistency of approach across what is a large and diverse organisation. The action plans detail the required approach to the use of procurement across the entire Council. These need to be developed further for certain areas with additional detail to cater for the individual specialist circumstances. This document addresses all the key procurement improvement and Efficiency Agenda issues and is structured using the four main themes of the National Procurement Strategy: Providing Leadership and Building Capacity; Partnering and Collaboration; Doing Business Electronically; and Stimulating Markets and Achieving Community Benefits. What Is Procurement? Traditionally, local government and others have viewed procurement as just about tenders and contracts. In reality this is only the purchasing cycle. Procurement is much wider as illustrated below.

“Procurement” is the process of acquiring goods, works and services, covering both acquisition from third parties and from in-house providers. The process spans the whole cycle from identification of needs, through to the end of a services contract or the end of the useful life of an asset. It involves option appraisal and the critical “make or buy” decision which may result in the provision of services in-house in appropriate circumstances.”

National Procurement Strategy 23rd October 2003


The Council’s Use of Procurement The Council already ensures that effective purchasing decisions are made for goods, works and services to satisfy an immediate tactical/operational requirement. We are now developing an ability to fully take account of whole life costs and the Council’s wider objectives. “Strategic Procurement” is using the Council’s overall spend strategically - as well as tactically and operationally. This is not the same as “A Strategic Procurement” which is the process to obtain a high-value strategic good, service or work. The adoption of procurement as an effective tool, using it both tactically and strategically to ensure the delivery of the Council’s objectives, will require the Council to change its culture and approach as well as develop and implement supporting policies, procedures and practices. Effective use of procurement across the Council will only be delivered through the active participation of all those who control budgets and authorise expenditure as well as those with the appropriate technical expertise. The implementation of this Procurement Strategy does not however require a change in the structure of the Council. The Council’s Strategic Objectives Between them, the Vision for Kent, the Public Service Agreement (PSA) and Towards 2010 provide the foundation for the Council’s commitments over the next few years. The Vision for Kent (also known as the Community Strategy) is the long-term plan and has eight themes: Economic success – opportunities for all Learning for everyone Improved health, care and well-being Environmental excellence Stronger and safer communities Enjoying life Keeping Kent moving High quality homes Towards 2010 sets out seven key areas: Increased prosperity for Kent through business growth and job creation; Transformation in education Reduced congestion Improved health and quality of life Quality homes in a well managed environment A safer Kent Continued improvements in services while keeping council tax down


Council Spending The graph below shows the results of a high-level analysis of the Council’s external spend. It excludes salary, pension costs and schools’ delegated budgets.

PROCUREMENT: Kent County Council (2006/07)

0 100 200 300 400

Social Care

Buildings

Roads andRegeneration

Other

Buses and Taxi's

Equipment andSupplies

Waste Disposal

IT

SpecialEducation

Cat

egor

y

£ Millions

capital £135M

capital £62M

£ Millions

10

24

50

28

34

62

122

169

363

862

The Efficiency Agenda, formed from the Gershon report, is based on four workstreams: • corporate services (back office) • procurement (procured goods and services including sector specific areas in construction,

roads and social care) • productive time • transactions For local authorities the major areas of spend fall into the first two Gershon workstreams. The above graph shows that for the Council, with the addition of waste as a sector specific area, the six workstreams identified by the South East Centre of Excellence incorporate over 95% of the total external spend. The South East Centre of Excellence’s workstreams are: • social care; • buildings; • transport (roads, buses & taxis); • supplies;


• back office; and • waste.


PROCUREMENT STRATEGY Providing Leadership and Building Capacity Objective “There should be a commitment from the top of each council (leader, chief executive, procurement champion) to procurement excellence by managing it strategically and resourcing it adequately.”

National Procurement Strategy 23rd October 2003 Current Status The Council is strongly committed to providing leadership and enhancing its capacity in its use of procurement. This Procurement Strategy is designed to take the Council’s use of procurement forward, building on the strong foundations that currently exist. Senior level sponsorship of procurement and this Strategy is provided by the Chief Executive as Chair of the Procurement Board, the Director of Finance as the Chief Officer Procurement Champion, and by the Leader of the Council as Member Procurement Champion. These Champions are the “Change Agents” for the Council’s use of procurement and their primary role is to promote, encourage, challenge and drive improved use of procurement across the Council. A clear structure supporting these “Change Agents”, including governance arrangements, exists consisting of: • the Strategic Procurement Unit as the Council’s ‘centre of expertise’ for procurement

issues; • the Procurement Board, chaired by the Chief Executive, comprising senior officers

responsible for the procurement activities across the six major areas of spend, together with representation from Communities and Children, Families and Education Directorates, Legal Services and Finance; and

• the Procurement Forum, chaired by the Head of Financial Services, comprising the senior

officers actively undertaking the procurement activities. The specific roles are: Budget Holders – Budget Holders are tasked with delivering the Council’s Strategic Objectives and are also the key group in the Council’s effective use of procurement. This Strategy can only be delivered with their active participation.


Members – The Strategic Procurement Unit works with Members to ensure they are involved effectively both for individual procurement projects and in aligning the use of procurement to the Council’s overall objectives. Member Procurement Champion – The Leader of the Council provides the procurement voice in the Cabinet, promoting the procurement vision particularly with members and gaining their commitment to change. He also champions the corporate procurement strategy, its alignment with corporate objectives, and its implementation. Chief Officer Procurement Champion – The Director of Finance provides the procurement voice on the Chief Officer’s Group advocating an organisation-wide approach and support to the Procurement Strategy, motivating and gaining commitment to change, and monitoring its implementation. Strategic Procurement Unit - The National Procurement Strategy requires all large councils to have a corporate procurement team. The Strategic Procurement Unit fulfils this role for the Council but the procurement activity will remain devolved to the areas of specialist procurement within directorates. The Strategic Procurement Unit is responsible for procurement strategy, policies and procedures and for ensuring the use of procurement is co-ordinated successfully across the Council. This co-ordinating role will ensure that the opportunities for aggregation of requirements and joint benefits are achieved. It also has a central role in providing the mechanism for ensuring that lessons learnt on one project are disseminated to others thus improving the Council’s knowledge base and improving the potential for success. The Strategic Procurement Unit will be the main link to the South-East Centre of Excellence, other councils and to central government on all procurement related matters. Procurement Board - The Board’s terms of reference include supporting, overseeing and approving the Council’s overall approach to Procurement including compliance with the National Procurement Strategy and the sharing of expertise across all procurement activities. This Board, and the Procurement Forum, are the fundamental elements to ensure that the Council’s devolved procurement structure maintains a consistency of approach and maximises the efficiencies available to an organisation of this size and complexity. Procurement Forum - The Forum provides the conduit for the sharing of experience across the Council and the dissemination and collection of relevant information.


Plan of Action The implementation of this Procurement Strategy will require decisive and sustained leadership from Members and Chief Officers to ensure that the Council is an organisation that is proactive, joined up and visionary in its approach to the delivery of best in class services. To support this approach there are a number of key tasks for the Council. These include: • the review of all of the Council’s procurement related policies, regulations and

procedures to ensure they support, and don’t hinder, the delivery of the Procurement Strategy and enhance the use of procurement to deliver the Council’s objectives. This will be led by the Strategic Procurement Unit;

• the production of clear guidance on the new policies; • the communication of this both internally and externally; and • the provision of targeted training. The Council will strive for the correct balance of encouraging innovation and responsible risk taking with the requirement for ensuring the correct use of public resources. The Council’s policies on ethics and fraud prevention will be included in this review. Some of the specific areas that will be addressed are: Basis of Procurement Decisions - The Council will make its procurement decisions to further its strategic objectives and on the basis of best value for money (the economically most advantageous offer in the EU and UK regulations). Best value is defined as “the optimum combination of whole life costs and benefits to meet the customer’s requirement”. Contracts will not be awarded only on the basis of lowest initial price. There will always be an assessment of quality, benefits and the costs that will be incurred by the Council throughout the life of the asset or contract period. Business Cases - The use of robust and effective Business Cases will be extended across the Council. This will provide a similar effective challenge to all procurements above £100,000 that the Project Approval Group gives currently to capital projects over £1m. Project Management - The Council actively supports the development of Project Management as a core competence of the organisation for the effective management of time, cost, quality and risk in projects. A programme to widen use of the appropriate elements of the Prince II methodology is underway across the Council. The Council undertakes a vast array of differing types and sizes of procurements and it is not possible to create a one-size-fits-all approach to procurement project management. However the benefits for all large procurements of a combination of using a more formal approach to


project management, the creation of a robust business case after a rigorous options appraisal, and ensuring the identification and correct allocation of all risks are worthwhile. The Strategic Procurement Unit will provide guidance on what size and types of procurements need what level of project management rigour. Risk Management - Effective use of procurement strengthens the Council’s overall management of the organisation, complementing and supporting other management tools such as the Risk Register. The Risk Register identifies specific risks to the Council and the delivery of its services, and consequently the Council will take specific procurement decisions as part of its mitigation and handling of the identified risks. Forward Planning - To ensure the effective use of procurement the Council will aggregate its existing directorate contract registers into one single register for the whole Council. This Contracts Register will cover all procurements and contracts to be tendered and/or awarded by the Council over £50,000. It will be user friendly to ensure it is an effective tool both for the Council’s internal use and for its suppliers. The Contracts Register will be enhanced to include all future known procurements – both for the renewal of existing period based contracts and for new projects/requirements. To achieve this, close linkages will be made with the directorate and business unit planning process and the Council’s Medium Term Financial and Service Plans (MTFP & MTSP). As the Council’s use of this becomes more sophisticated the period it looks forward will be increased. The Strategic Procurement Unit will provide guidance on the types of procurements to be included and the required information. Challenge - The Council will strengthen its challenge processes across all procurements without imposing an unnecessary administrative overhead. Large procurements will be subject to Office of Government Commerce style Gateway reviews at the appropriate stages. Gateway reviews provide a formalised structure of external reviews of a project at several key stages as shown in the following diagram.


The Council believes that the formal Gateway review processes administered within local government by the 4Ps organisation is not always the most appropriate to be used. The Council will therefore use a mixed economy approach and in specific circumstances will undertake an equivalent process using either its own staff not directly involved in the procurement being reviewed or peers from other councils in the region as an additional resource. The Council will also actively support reciprocal arrangements where it can assist other councils whilst exposing its own staff to personal development opportunities. As part of the challenge and the options appraisal process the Council will take into account the appropriate use of the partnering, collaboration and trading approaches. Contract Management - Effective procurement is measured by the outcomes and not by completion of the process. Contracts must be managed throughout their life to ensure that the benefits identified in the business case are delivered. The Council will expand the use of contract management, building on the areas of current best practice. Documented Guidance - The Council’s current procurement related policies are published in a number of separate documents. No single document contains them all. The Strategic Procurement Unit will lead a thorough review of all procurement related policies and procedures. These will be amended in line with this Procurement Strategy and republished in a single document to be titled “Spending the Council’s Money”. “Spending the Council’s Money” will also include clear guidance on the implementation of these policies and procedures. This was published in 2007. Training - With the wider view on the definition of ‘procurement’ and its use throughout the Council it is important that the skills base of Council staff is understood and effective steps taken where it needs to be re-aligned. The Strategic Procurement Unit will work with Personnel & Development to ensure that procurement is seen by managers as a core competence both for themselves and for their staff and that adequate training opportunities are available for them. Whilst supporting the need for adequate numbers of appropriately skilled procurement professionals the Council understands that its effective use of procurement requires the active involvement of all staff engaged in procurement activity. As a consequence training resources will be targeted at the:

• general understanding of the use of procurement as a tool to help deliver the Council’s objectives;

• identification of a need, the challenge process including options appraisal and the

use of a business case and the writing of the requirement; and

• understanding and commitment to the Procurement Strategy and policies.


Partnering and Collaboration Objective “The strategic objective of partnering is the delivery of better services to citizens through the creation of sustainable partnerships between councils and suppliers in the public, private, social enterprise and voluntary sectors for the delivery of services and the carrying out of major projects, including construction. The strategic objective of collaboration is to obtain better value by bringing councils and other public bodies together at local, regional and at national levels to combine their buying power and create shared services.”

National Procurement Strategy 23rd October 2003 Current Status The Council utilises a wide range of contracting opportunities, partnering, collaboration and trading across various units and actively looks to maximise the proven advantages. Whilst there are areas where close collaboration exists with other councils and public bodies, these are still limited and collaboration is not yet enshrined within the Council’s management culture and operational practice. Plan of Action There is no single solution that can be applied in all cases therefore the procurement approach needs to be varied to fit the circumstances. The Strategic Procurement Unit will lead on work to define the most appropriate approach. Initial analysis of the Council’s external spend shows the following four areas: • Non-Critical - predominantly one-off, low value purchases, publications, dry-cleaning

etc. – estimated spend £10m pa; • Non-Critical General Supplies - high volume, low to medium value purchases,

stationery, furniture, vehicles etc. - estimated spend £60m pa • Business Critical - operational procurements, primarily within service directorates,

social care, highways maintenance etc.; • Strategic - high value, high risk projects spanning more than one Directorate;

Business Critical and Strategic estimated combined spend of £750m pa.


The Council’s approach to these four areas is: • for the Non-Critical area: to minimise the volume of purchases and to reduce transaction

costs for remaining orders by using electronic trading tools such as purchasing cards. • for the Non-Critical General Supplies: to standardise and aggregate wherever possible

to maximise the purchasing power whilst minimising transaction costs. The Council will strengthen its trading links with Commercial Services and use it as the Council’s primary route for this category of spend.

• for the Business Critical area: the Council will continue to support devolved

procurement by specialist teams operating under this Procurement Strategy. • for Strategic procurements: to be owned and led by the most appropriate Council unit,

resourced appropriately and supported by the other specialist areas as necessary. The Council has fully endorsed the use of Partnering particularly with the adoption of the ‘Rethinking Construction’ principles. The Council will look to expand its use, where appropriate, across other areas of the Council’s spend. The Council will proactively seek out collaborative opportunities with other councils and other public bodies, through active participation both in existing consortia and the Regional Centre of Excellence. The Council will use the identified collaborative opportunity wherever this is of benefit: • exclusively to the Council; • to both the Council and the other bodies; or • exclusively for the other bodies, except where there is a negative impact on the Council. The Council will also look to exploit trading opportunities wherever they provide additional benefit. The Council however acknowledges the potential conflict between trading and collaboration activities and will seek the appropriate balance.


Doing Business Electronically Objective • “To achieve efficiencies in the procure-to-pay cycle including reduction in cycle time and

reduction in transaction costs. This will free resources that can be directed into front line services.

• to use e-marketplaces to assist councils to access framework agreements and contracts.”

National Procurement Strategy 23rd October 2003

Current Status The Council fully supports the drive to e-enable procurement processes wherever this is supported by the business case. In doing so it acknowledges the confusion that the inconsistent use of the term e-Procurement can cause, as this is a generic term covering a number of differing products and services. There are a number of government initiatives / targets for local authorities in this area, including Best Value Performance Indicator (BVPI) 157, Implementing Electronic Government (IEG) Statements and the National Procurement Strategy milestones. These require the co-ordination of the separate elements to create an overall solution. The Council has investigated, and will continue to investigate, the individual component parts of e-Procurement and will implement those appropriate to it’s infrastructure and needs. Clear business owners have been identified for the elements of e-Procurement as follows:

e-Procurement element Owner e-Ordering * Director of Finance e-Invoicing * Director of Finance e-Payments * Director of Finance purchase and payment cards Director of Finance e-Tenders Strategic Procurement Manager marketplaces and catalogues Strategic Procurement Manager e-Auctions Strategic Procurement Manager

*Corporate systems, including the integrated Oracle ERP system, only.

The Council has dedicated a specific part of its website, www.kent.gov.uk, to procurement issues. This contains details of forthcoming tendering opportunities and information on how to do business with the Council, giving contact details including e-mail addresses.


http://www.kent.gov.uk/

Plan of Action The Council commissioned an external review of its ‘purchase–to pay’ processes in 2004. This resulted in recommendations to streamline and rationalise the existing processes across the Council to provide a more uniform approach thus allowing a simpler e-enabling of the process. The Council will prepare the supporting business case and then look to exploit the Oracle implementation to provide this functionality as part of the Finance Business Solutions Programme during 2005. This implementation, together with improvements to the electronic linking of the Council to the Commercial Services’ systems and the directorate’s business systems will deliver commitment accounting and provide additional consistent and accurate information from which to make more informed procurement decisions. Taking the elements individually the Council’s e-Procurement Strategy is:

• e-Ordering - this functionality will be provided through the upgrade of existing business

systems within directorates and integrate them with the Oracle ERP solution and, for those transactions where this is not appropriate, implement the appropriate Oracle solution;

• e-Invoicing - functionality to be included with the Finance Business Solutions Programme;

• e-Payments - to continue using the electronic BACS and CHAPS services as the

Council’s primary method of payments with the BACSTEL service implemented in May 2005;

• purchase & payment cards - the Council will introduce a single, Kent County Council

branded, card using the Government Procurement Card (GPC) solution during 2005. These are being utilised to improve services and/or reduce the administrative costs in three specific areas:

• for use by clients to obtain individual social care. The pilot of which commenced

in 2004;

• for the replacement of imprest accounts. All applicable imprest accounts will be replaced by cards during 2005/06; and

• for low-value ad-hoc purchases.

The Council will look to widen the use of these cards across the organisation as a result of successful pilots.

• e-Tenders - the constituent components include suppliers being able to access details of

the opportunities to tender on-line, to apply for inclusion in the tender process and receiving and submitting tender documentation electronically. www.kent.gov.uk gives details of the Council’s forthcoming tenders including contact details, via e-mail, for potential suppliers to register their interest in the opportunity. The Council uses e-mail as



one method of issuing tender documentation and will look to use this wherever appropriate. The Council has also used electronic tendering, i.e. the electronic receipt and evaluation of tenders, for some of its energy contracts with LASER and has also piloted this within Social Services. The Council will take the lessons learnt from these pilots and other implementations nationally and internationally with the aim of creating the business case to prove its wider use across the Council.

• marketplaces and catalogues - Commercial Services through its framework contracts and

warehousing operations already acts as the Council’s marketplace. This role is enhanced as it moves to becoming ‘the Council’s sole route to the market’ in the commodity goods and services area. Its e-enabled catalogue was introduced early in 2005. The Strategic Procurement Unit will monitor the usage and effectiveness of this arrangement whilst also keeping abreast of developments elsewhere.

The procurement information on www.kent.gov.uk will be enhanced through 2005 including the publication of the following documents as they become available: • the “Selling to the Council” guide; and • the “Spending the Council’s Money” procedures document. The Council will continue to actively support the National e-Procurement Programme (NePP) and collaborate with the South-East Centre of Excellence to ensure that its e-Procurement Strategy is kept under review and informed of the latest developments and opportunities. The Council will also continue to source best practice advice both internally, where available, and externally.

The Council in implementing its e-Procurement Strategy will ensure that this remains at all times closely aligned with the Procurement Strategy especially ensuring that existing and potential suppliers (including local SMEs) are not unreasonably disadvantaged by the Council’s use of electronic trading.



Stimulating Markets and Achieving Community Benefit Objective The strategic objectives are that councils should: • “engage actively with suppliers • use procurement to help deliver corporate objectives, including the economic, social and

environmental objectives set out in the community plan.” National Procurement Strategy 23rd October 2003

Current Status The Council has traditionally benefited from its scale and stature in the local government market place with a ready supply of firms wanting to do business with it. Whilst this is still generally true the Council does not wish to become complacent and acknowledges that by not actively engaging with suppliers it could potentially miss out on opportunities from different sources of supply. Analysis of the Council’s payment systems, which are currently the only reliable source of information on the Council’s suppliers, showed that the Council made payments to over 21,000 different firms in a twelve-month period 2003/4. This Strategy has already acknowledged that the Council currently does not procure on a strategic basis and must do more to make a greater contribution to the delivery of its strategic objectives. Plan of Action The Council is committed to a mixed range of suppliers to help stimulate a varied and competitive market place. To achieve this the Council will take a more proactive role in its interaction with suppliers. Supplier Numbers - It is acknowledged that even for an organisation of the Council’s scale, effective interaction with over 21,000 firms is impractical. To enable it to improve the management, and thus the quality, of its supplier relationships the Council must significantly reduce this number. The Council will aim to be making direct payments to quantifiably fewer firms by the end of 2005 and to fewer than 10,000 by the end of 2006. Reductions in the number of suppliers to whom the Council makes direct payments to will be achieved in a number of ways: • use of purchase cards for ‘Non-Critical’ low value orders allowing the Council to make

just one payment to the card provider;


• more consistent aggregation across the Council of purchases for ‘Non-critical general supplies’ resulting in transactions with fewer contracted suppliers;

• use of purchase cards by Social Services’ clients giving them greater control over both the commissioning and payment elements of the procurement;

• increased use of purchase cards by Social Services for transactions with service providers; and

• sensible use of partnering and sub-contracting.

This policy does not apply across all sectors of the Council. Specific sectors, such as some areas of Social Care, would benefit from additional suppliers and the Council’s ongoing work to encourage additional suppliers to enter these markets is not incompatible with the overall aim of reducing the administrative costs of dealing direct with large numbers of suppliers. In addition, one of the Council’s strategic objectives is to promote Kentish produce and to increase its own purchasing of local goods. Supplier Monitoring - The Strategic Procurement Unit will work closely with Finance to regularly monitor the information available on the Council’s supplier base through the payment systems. The Council undertook research in 2004, as part of its commitment to promoting the economic, social and environmental wellbeing of the community, into the amount of expenditure with local suppliers. This gave the Council a better understanding of its impact on the local economy resulting in a number of practical recommendations that have helped inform this Procurement Strategy. Comparable work will be commissioned for other targeted elements of the supplier base such as small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs), ethnic firms, and social and voluntary sector service providers. Marketing the Council - The Council will improve the way it markets itself to suppliers building on the practices and benefits currently being achieved by Social Services. The Council’s review of its procurement processes includes the principle of making it easier for suppliers to understand how to do business with the Council. Supporting this approach a basic “Selling to the Council” guide was published on www.kent.gov.uk in 2004 and this will be enhanced through 2005. The Council will expand its consultations with the business community through local and national bodies and special interest groups. These will include, amongst others: • Chambers of Commerce; • Small Business Federation; and • DTI’s Small Business Unit.



Voluntary Sector - The Council agreed a Voluntary Sector Compact in October 2003 which builds upon the history of partnership working between the two sectors to improve services for the people of Kent. Mechanisms are in place for the evaluation and review of this Kent Compact and Codes of Practice, and to update the agreement and document as necessary. SMEs – The Council contributed to the drafting of the National Procurement Concordat for Small Medium Sized Enterprises with the Department of Trade and Industry in 2004 and endorsed the final version through the national sign-up in January 2007. Diversity - The Council will take a positive approach to removing the specific barriers to trading with individual sectors. This will be applied across the supply chain and where it is not appropriate for the Council to trade directly it will encourage, and include as contractual commitments where appropriate, the use of these sectors as sub-contractors. The Council’s Equality and Diversity Policy Statement states that the Council will build diversity considerations into its business and people-management processes, including business resource planning and policy development. The Council also acknowledges its duty to promote race equality and sees its use of procurement as essential to help fulfil this. The amended Race Relations Act (RRA) outlaws discrimination in all functions of local authorities, including procurement. In complying with the RRA the Council will ensure that public money is not spent on practices that lead to unlawful racial discrimination, and that it is used to support and encourage equality of opportunity and good community relations. Contractors, and potential contractors, need to be aware of the legal duty placed on the Council since it has implications for them. The Strategic Procurement Unit will work with the Corporate Diversity Team and will produce guidance to support the Council's Equality and Diversity Policy Statement objectives and also its obligations under the RRA.


SUMMARY In endorsing this Procurement Strategy and undertaking the stated actions the Council formally acknowledges the importance of effective use of procurement in contributing to the delivery of its strategic objectives. Effective use of procurement alone cannot deliver these. The following puts the generic illustration taken from the I&DeA published guidance into the Kent County Council context and shows the important interdependencies.

Financiaregulations

Financial procedures

Strategfor Staff

Staff Handbook.

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Spending the Council’sMone

Operational

DirectoratBusiness Plans

Vision for Kent &T2010

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The Council wholeheartedly embraces “sustainable procurement” through the wider cost/benefit approach on the social, economic and environmental level in keeping with sustainable market development, which this Strategy supports. This Procurement Strategy will be subject to an annual review of progress and will also be ‘benchmarked’ against the National Procurement Strategy for Local Government for compliance. The Strategy will be available both in hard copy and electronically, via the intranet and internet on www.kent.gov.uk.



procurement strategy 2005 â€“ updated 2007

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