Recommendation 13

Across the 20 projects and programmes examined by the NAO, 14 are being procured partly or wholly non-competitively, despite the fact that ‘competition by default’ has been departmental policy for nearly a decade. In only four of these cases was this due to ‘sovereignty capability’ requirements, whereby the government must source capabilities from specific suppliers due to the need to protect the UK’s national security interests or operational advantage.31 In the absence of competition, there is a risk that the Department will continue to award further contracts to poorly performing suppliers. The Cabinet Office’s recent green paper on public procurement proposes that it should be easier to take into account past supplier performance when awarding future contracts.32 Sharing risks with suppliers