The economic, social and political evolutions, as well as budget constraints, impose the review of regulations to make them simpler and more efficient in relation to both contracting authorities and undertakings. On the other hand, their reforming is necessary to enable public procurement at the best value for money while observing the principles of transparency and competition.
Public procurement regulated by European directives is 3.4% of the Union’s GDP, which is EUR 425 Billion for 2011 data.
By adopting a legislative package of 3 directives, the European Parliament has proposed to initiate a reform in public procurement. The new norms simplify public procurement procedures and make them more flexible to the benefit of public buyers and undertakings, especially SMEs.
The new texts adopted inform us that contracting authorities will have more possibilities of negotiating the contractual provisions with undertakings, being thus able to obtain services that would better correspond to their needs and the minimum durations of procedures will reduce. To further reduce bureaucracy, the communication of public procurement will be made electronically.
Regional and local authorities will set the deadlines of the procedure (for example, the deadline for submitting bids) together with the undertakings that participate in the tender.
Only the undertaking that wins the contract will have to present the whole documentation to prove that it meets the conditions necessary for completing the respective contract. A statutory declaration on meeting these conditions will be sufficient to participate in the procedure. Thus, the number of necessary documents for selecting undertakings will be significantly reduced.
Moreover, the European SMEs, which have a significant potential of generating jobs, innovation and economic growth, have to have easier access to public procurement procedures. Therefore, contracting authorities will be encouraged to award a larger number of contracts to more, smaller undertakings, than just one contract to a large undertaking, and the turnover required for participating in a public procurement procedure will be limited to maximum the double of the estimated contract value.
It is important to say that the new European norms don’t affect the national organisation of public services; member states select by themselves the organisation of public services. Thus, a public authority can either carry out by itself the public interest responsibilities it is in charge of, relying on its own resources, or to resort to exterior entities.
Public procurement and concession norms are not applicable except for when services are outsourced when a public authority decides to resort to this form of organisation.
Reducing administrative formalities
Bidders can prove their financial situation, their skills and the fact that they meet necessary criteria through statutory statements. These statements replace the set of supporting documents which should have been submitted. The single European procurement document, a standard statutory statement, will enable this. Contracting authorities must accept the offers of all bidders whose financial situation meets the contract execution criteria. In the past, small bidders were often excluded because the contracting authorities imposed high annual turnovers, even for small value contracts. Normally, in the future, the requested annual turnover should be maximum two times the contract value.
Large contracts can often be divided into lots that allow small companies to participate. Therefore, the contracting authorities are encouraged to divide larger contracts into lots. They will not be forced to divide the contracts, but if they don’t do it, they will have to explain why.
The new directives rely on an approach which stipulates a “set of instruments” which provides contracting authorities with more flexibility, more options and new methods of organising procedures. Thus, they can benefit from improved freedom in selecting the type of procedures that suits them best.
Contracting authorities will also have more freedom in organising award procedures in a flexible and efficient way. The management norms of public procurement procedures have been carefully reviewed to make them more practical.
Thus, the deadlines for submitting participation applications and bids have been reduced which means that contracting authorities will have the maximum flexibility to organise faster and simpler procurement procedures.
A new single European on-line procurement document will permit the auto-certification, the obligation of submitting documentation in the qualification phase being eliminated. Naturally, contracting authorities will only have to check the documentation of the selected bidder at the end of the tender procedure before making the decision of awarding the contract. For this purpose, they will have rapid access to the updated and reliable documentation available in the electronic data base of the domestic market.
Experience showed that jointcross-border procurement procedures can lead to better results while turning into account the advantages of the single market. For the first time, the new directives include clear and explicit norms on joint cross-border procurement, providing contracting authorities and central procurement bodies with the necessary legal security.
In case of open procedures, contracting authorities are free to decide on the order of phases. Thus, they can choose the regular order which includes the admission of bidders first and then evaluating bids and making the contract award decision. But, where applicable, they can choose to reverse this order and to analyse offers first and then if there are reasons of elimination and if selection criteria have been met.
Contracting authorities can eliminate a bidder from the procedure if it proves it had persistent problems in carrying out a public contract in the past.
For railway operators and infrastructure managers, the adoption of this law package is an important measure because most of them are public authorities. Directive 25/2014 on public procurements by entities activating in the sector of water, energy, transport and postal services, called the Utilities Directive, will be applied in the railway sector by all state companies.
The Community of European Railway and Infrastructure Companies (CER) welcomes the review of directives in the public procurement reform considering that the new norms will simplify and clarify texts to reduce legal costs and useless administrative costs.
CER Executive Director Libor Lochman said: “We are happy that the railway sector´s main issues of concern have been taken into account by the EU Institutions. However, we regret that the Directive does not completely ensure a level playing field between private and public undertakings, a necessary pillar for the execution of public rail transport services. Nevertheless, we are sure that this important piece of legislation will contribute to the further development of a competitive railway market in the EU.”
Source: ec.europa.eu
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