Report on ACT Government Procurement

The ACT Legislative Assembly has issued a report of the "Inquiry into ACT Government Procurement" today. This report is on how the local government of Canberra buys products and services. I made a written submission and talked to the committee on green ICT procurement and small ICT businesses. The committee report is 93 pages, with 25 recommendations. Here are the recommendations relevant to my evidence:

Recommendation 9

3.15 The Committee recommends that ACT Procurement Solutions investigate the viability of adopting the Commonwealth’s online tender system or modifying its own system to provide a similar targeted service to users. ...

Recommendation 13

3.46 The Committee recommends that the ACT Government ensure that regular training is provided for all officers engaged in procurement activities on the latest developments in public sector procurement.

Recommendation 15

The Committee recommends that the Chief Minister’s Annual Report 4.32 Directions be amended to specify that ACT Government agencies are to report on compliance with sustainable procurement requirements.

Recommendation 16

4.48 The Committee recommends that ACT Government agencies should be required to select goods, services and works on the basis of triple bottom line impacts. Guidelines should be developed to assess these impacts, including whole-of-life cycle impacts.

Recommendation 17

4.49 The Committee recommends that the ACT Auditor-General conduct a review of a selection of recent procurements to evaluate the influence that ACT Government sustainability policies are having on the procurement process.

Recommendation 18

4.50 The Committee recommends that explicit reference to sustainability, expressed in terms similar to those used in section 11 of the Financial Management Act 1996, be included in section 22A of the Government Procurement Act 2001 as matters which must be considered in pursuing “...the best value for money” objective.

Recommendation 19

4.51 The Committee recommends that the ACT Government ensure that all officers engaged in procurement activities receive training on: (i) incorporating sustainability considerations into the request for tender development process (ii) incorporating sustainability considerations into the tender selection process, and (iii) engaging with suppliers on sustainability issues. ...

From: Inquiry into ACT Government Procurement, Standing Committee on Public Accounts, ACT Legislative Assembly, 23 November 2010

Here are the mentions of my evidence in the report:

ICT tenders
3.9 Information and communications technology (ICT) is a sector characterised by many small and independent contractors. An independent Information Technology professional 45 , provided specific examples of inadequacies in the ACT’s online tender system which imposed a burden on the small-scale contractor:
...the ACT system every week sends me a notice saying that there are new ACT government tenders that I can apply for. But it does not say what they are. ... I then have to hunt around to see if there is anything relevant and to get a particular tender document I have to [type] in my ABN and all my details over and over again. 46

3.10 This was contrasted with the Commonwealth and New Zealand systems which allow the user to register company details and particular areas of interest and to access documentation with one click without the necessity of repeatedly providing details. 47

3.11 The individual IT professional, echoing the comments of the HIA quoted above, also described the procedures surrounding public indemnity insurance, which he is required to have, as a problem for micro businesses, involving the need to produce a statutory declaration of his income counter-signed by an auditor and an accountant. He also argued that the indemnity amount was set at an unrealistically high level for a one-person business. 48

3.12 In response to questions from the Committee, ACT Procurement Solutions outlined a number of steps being taken to streamline procedures with regard to ICT, in particular the implementation by InTACT, the ACT Government’s ICT service provider, of panel arrangements for consultant services. 49

45 Mr Tom Worthington, Transcript of evidence, 4 March 2010 and Submission No. 4, Mr Tom Worthington.
46 Mr Tom Worthington, Transcript of evidence, 4 March 2010, p. 2.
47 Ibid., p. 2.
48 Ibid., pp. 4-6.
49 Ms Robyn Hardy, Executive Director, ACT Procurement Solutions, Transcript of evidence, 30 March 2010, p. 50.
...

Procurement training

3.44 An individual noted in his submission to the Committee that the Canberra Institute of Technology (CIT) is a leader in the field of e-learning and that many nationally accredited courses in procurement were available. 74 He suggested that the ACT Government use this capability in its staff training. 75

74 Submission No. 4, Mr Tom Worthington.
75 Ibid., p. 1.

From: Inquiry into ACT Government Procurement, Standing Committee on Public Accounts, ACT Legislative Assembly, 23 November 2010