Anthony Round
Anthony Round
11 February, 2025
Business

Transformational new Procurement Act goes live in 2 weeks

The Government’s new Procurement Act 2023 goes live on February 24th 2025 and will transform public sector procurement, making it simpler and more straightforward for the local business community to find and win Public Sector Contracts

Government Procurement is Changing

‘Public Sector’ refers to the NHS, blue light services, schools, colleges and universities, local and national government and a host of other organisations such as housing associations and even the BBC. 

The new Act is particularly good news for small businesses.  The Government spends £400Bn annually through public procurement channels and has a target of spending 1/3rd or around £121Bn with SME’s.  They currently award just 11% directly to SME’s but claim around 24% when they count in SME’s as sub-contractors to Strategic Suppliers.

This heads up about the new Act is important as one of the key changes will be the provision of a new Central Digital Platform to enhance the existing Find a Tender service.

Public Sector Spend through Procurement is around £400Bn annually
Public Sector Spend through Procurement is around £400Bn annually Credit: PX Media - Royalty Free

The Central Digital Platform will serve as a one-stop hub for suppliers to register, manage their profiles, and engage with opportunities.  It will:

  • Feature a simple registration and identification for both suppliers and buyers.
  • Store suppliers’ core business details that can be used for multiple bids.
  • Enable easy management and updating of core information quickly, and shared easily between suppliers, eSenders (private tender platforms) and buyers.
  • Make public procurement opportunities visible making it easier to search and set up alerts for tenders of interest for suppliers.
  • Allow for procurement noticing throughout the procurement lifecycle.
  • Capture procurement data and eventually allow creation of dashboards to analyse that data.

All suppliers looking to work in the Public Sector, even if already registered on Find a Tender or Contracts Finder must register on the new Central Digital Platform.

Government is targeting £121Bn of spend with SME's annually
Government is targeting £121Bn of spend with SME's annually Credit: Ivelin Radkov - Royalty Free

Tony Round, Director of Brigstock based Maxim Growth said ‘The new Act is simply transformational, the Government buys anything and everything you can imagine and with the new Act, every supplier has a chance of winning a contract, price is no longer the sole defining factor.’

How to Register

Registration is free and can be done at any time after launch.  Registration will open from 00.01 hrs on 24 February and if you already use Find a Tender, the URL will be the same: www.gov.uk/find-tender