UK Procurement Bill, General Principles, and Additivity – Why There Is No Such Risk

By: Albert Sánchez-Graells (How To Crack A Nut)

Those following the commentary on the UK Procurement Bill will have noticed the discussions concerning the absence of a clause on the general principles of procurement [see e.g. K McGaughey, ‘Losing your principles – some early thoughts on the Procurement Bill’ (13 May 2022) http://shorturl.at/tFJP2]. In fact, there is already a proposed amendment by Baroness Hayman seeking to introduce the principles as initially envisaged in the green paper, which risks losing the additions that resulted from the public consultation. However, it is not certain that the amendment will make it to the final version of the future Act. One of the reasons behind resisting the inclusion of general principles seems to be a concern by legislative drafters that it would generate additivity — which I understand as the risk of creating self-standing obligations beyond those explicitly imposed by the specific provisions of the primary (and future secondary) legislation.

In my view, the inclusion of general principles cannot generate such a risk of additivity, as the role and function of those principles is to act as interpretive guides for the provisions in the legislation. They can hardly be seen as gap fillers or generators of self-standing obligations. Conversely, the absence of such general principles can be problematic, not only for creating a vacuum of interpretive guidance, but also for seemingly signalling a deviation from global standards.

Below are the reasons why I think the general principles of procurement, and in particular those of transparency and competition, should be included in an amended Bill before it completes its Parliamentary procedure.

GENERAL PRINCIPLES AS GLOBAL STANDARDS

Transparency and competition are crucial and intertwined general principles and/or goals in every procurement legislative framework. However, both are missing in the Procurement Bill, which thus lags international standards and best practice…

CONTINUE READING…