Guidance on procurement
Mainstreaming equality considerations in procurement: A guide for public authorities in England.
Buying better outcomes
Public authorities spend £236 billion each year on buying goods, works or services from other organisations across every sector. This purchasing power can be used by public authorities as a way to advance equality and, where appropriate, achieve wider social benefits, such as creating training or employment opportunities.
The Equality and Human Rights Commission has produced guidance that explains how public authorities may approach the task of ensuring that they comply with the public sector equality duty (PSED) obligations* at different stages of the procurement cycle and takes you through equality issues that you may need to consider at each stage.
Download: Buying better outcomes
The training materials and case study (below) are designed to complement the main guidance document (left).They are aimed at the public sector, at both a local and national level and generally work best with a mixed group of equality and procurement specialists. The aim has been to provide a resource which will facilitate working across departments and moving towards a shared understanding of responsibilities, terminology and processes.
This presentation is designed to be used flexibly, either with the training modules (right) or as a stand aloneresource. The presentation is not too technical, so should be suitable for both specialists and non specialists. It contains 28 slides with detailed speaking notes, which cross reference the relevant sections in the main guidance, and could form the basis of training sessions or facilitate less formal briefings. (Please note a few slides are the same as those used in the training modules and should be removed if used together.)
Identifying need and creating the specification (powerpoint, notes)
Barriers to and opportunities for wider implementation (powerpoint, notes)
Equalities, procurement and corporate objectives (powerpoint, notes)
Equalities and contract management (powerpoint, notes)
These training modules contain a short Powerpoint presentation with an exercise at the end and a 2/3 page brief for the facilitator. The presentation and slides should ideally take about an hour, but can be run in 45 minutes. They can be used flexibly and work well when used with the main presentation slides.
This report was commissioned from the New Economics Foundation in 2011. It uses the principles of Social Return on Investment (SROI) to identify the economic benefits for service users, society and the state of including equality outcomes in commissioning and procurement process, enabling public bodies to deliver better value for money for communities and the state.
It focuses on a mental health day service consortium in Camden which was commissioned using an outcomes commissioning model known as the Sustainable Commissioning Model (SCM).
Download: Equality outcomes Social Return on Investment Analysis (Full Version)
Download: Equality outcomes Social Return on Investment Analysis (Summary Version)
* Details of guidance currently under review.*
Last Updated: 29 Feb 2016