Announcements of new infrastructure are met with a weary sigh and the expectation that they will arrive decades late and billions over budget. We are world leaders in this. Getting this fixed is not flashy, but slow, involved and detail oriented.
Conservatives must be even bolder if we want to prevent an electoral wipeout, by further recognising and targeting the scale of the inefficiency problem.
Fundamentally, it’s all about giving greater priority to military risk over ‘civil’ risk (health and safety, risk of judicial review etc). It’s not about being cavalier – just taking proportionate steps to boost our deterrence, rather than being bogged down in bureaucracy.
Under Francis Maude, the Conservatives made real progress in driving down costs and improving the operation of Whitehall. Under Labour, that’s going into reverse.
If the new procurement policy means anything at all then it means ideological requirements could trump value for money.
The Defence Secretary said “the real battle for defence” will come in the Comprehensive Spending Review in 2024-25, and “I’m not sure I’ll be here in two years”.
Gove is ready to localise as much either as he wants to or as his colleagues will let him, or both. I hope it’s work in progress.
Public bodies should award contracts to tenderers operating in regions with the most economic need.
In that sense, his speech could easily have been given by a much more fitting figure for the Ditchley Foundation: Tony Blair.
Many of the most technically-gifted would run a mile from the strictures of military discipline. Greater agility in procurement could also give us an edge.
This is a contribution to the debate – now let’s see what the candidates offer during the week ahead.
At one point, City Hall officials told me the only way to get a project done was to hire external lawyers to take City Hall’s procurement lawyers to court.
The MoD should use the opportunity of Brexit to reflect on whether EU competition rules should continue to apply to procurement.
We must seize the opportunities to provide services in a more efficient way – cutting the long delays on public procurement is an obvious example.
By funnelling all consultancy spend through a single, rigid framework dominated by a handful of large providers, the new directive will drastically reduce competition in the procurement market.