Procurement News, Opinions and Latest Market Leads

With the Living Wage in London and Scotland rising, could paying the Living Wage actually boost your chances of winning work with the Government? Under recent rules coming into force in Scotland, firms bidding for public sector contracts will be expected to pay employees the Living Wage. The rules will also ban the exploitative use of […]

In response to UK government procurement reform, BiP Solutions has decided to give suppliers a helping hand through the release of the Ultimate Guide to Winning Government Contracts. Many businesses are put off public sector procurement, thinking it is too complex and resource heavy or that only large organisations win government business. Even companies that […]

With the UK adoption of the EU Public Contract Regulations (in February 2015) more focus has been put on ethical recruitment. Now public sector buyers can request employee checks not only of the bidding company’s employees, but also those of its  supply chain (at the pre-tender stage). Here the Association of Professional Staffing Companies (APSCo) […]

Government construction contracts have changed thanks to new BIM Compliance requirements. Building Information Models (BIM) are shared information hubs that exist to hold documents about a building’s infrastructure during its lifecycle (the time it is in use). Here Morgan Sindall Professional Services Principal Architect and BIM Consultant Trevor Strahan tells BiP reporter Julie Shennan how […]

The Scottish Government’s 2016-17 Draft Budget has pledged around £4 billion infrastructure investment over the next year. This investment will be spent on house building, transport and digital links, among other projects. This won’t just benefit those in construction; the investment will boost local and international businesses that rely on Scottish infrastructure for trade, logistics […]

Britain has overtaken the USA as one of the best places in the world to do business, according to a new report. The announcement, by the World Bank’s annual Doing Business Report, named the UK as the top country in the G7 for ease of doing business, ahead of the USA, Canada, Japan, Germany and […]

At the Conservative Party Conference 2015 Prime Minister David Cameron set out an ambitious agenda to make Britain the global success story of the 21st Century. So what exactly are the Conservative Party’s plans for the coming Parliament? The economy, housing and defence were the key targets for David Cameron in his first address to […]

The Scottish Government has announced that fair and sustainable procurement is at the heart of their policies to improve Scotland and boost economic recovery. Speaking at the Scottish Government’s 11th National Procurement Conference as part of Procurex Scotland Live 2015, Keith Brown, Cabinet Secretary for Infrastructure, Investment and Cities said that procurement is a key […]

A recent poll of UK businesses has revealed that firms are split over the crucial issue of the UK’s continued EU membership. The poll, undertaken by the Federation of Small Businesses on 6000 of its members, showed that overall, 47% of firms would vote to remain in the EU, with 41% voting to leave and […]

Jeremy Corbyn, the once rank outsider for the position of UK Labour Leader, has won his party’s leadership contest by a landslide, gaining almost 60% of members’ votes. The victory could mean a drastic change in Labour policy and a fundamental shift in the UK political landscape over the coming years. Caught in the middle […]