There is always value in having a fresh pair of eyes to assess how things are done - and Sir Philip Green's recent report highlights many examples of waste in government spending on commodity procurement, property and major contracts.
The procurement challenge for government however is not so much how to conduct further analysis of well known problems, but how to implement good practice across the whole of the public sector.
Since Sir Peter Gershon set up the Office of Government Commerce ten years ago as the government's centre of excellence for procurement, it has led collaborative procurement programmes, conducted capability reviews, provided contract databases and frameworks, policy guidance and best practice, and developed a professional network in the Government Procurement Service.
The ground-breaking efficiency review led by Gershon in 2004 resulted in significant procurement efficiency savings by 2007-08. Subsequently, Dr Martin Read, Martin Jay and Lord Carter have led work streams to improve commodity procurement, major contracts and property management. All of these were serious players with sound business experience who made progress, albeit slower than many of us would liked and believed was possible.
There is still a long way to go. We know that government purchasing power must be maximised; as Sir Edward Leigh noted in an open letter in March 2010 to his successor as chair of the Committee of Public Accounts: ‘Though it [government] is a hugely powerful customer, it rarely gets the best deal when buying goods and services and is too often ripped off by suppliers.’
Cabinet Office minister Francis Maude was inevitably supportive in his comments, which referred to the staggering scale of waste uncovered by Green and the need for government to act in a more business-like manner.
It would be surprising, however, if he learned anything of substance that was new in terms of how to eliminate waste. It's a tough challenge and dwarfs, in organisational terms and scale of challenge, anything that Green may ever have to tackle, which might cast doubt over how his recommendations for public sector procurement issues can translate into a coherent programme for action.
Clive Sparrow is government and infrastructure advisory director at Grant Thornton
