News item | 17-02-2022 | 11:46
The Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate Policy (EZK) is working on various measures to improve legal protection for entrepreneurs when tendering. With the published ‘complaint handling guide for tenders’, contracting authorities, such as municipalities, are encouraged with advice to set up or improve an independent complaints desk.
The government has previously announced that it wishes to further professionalize government procurement practices, which are used to purchase 87 billion euros worth of services and products, by improving legal protection, among other things.
Preparing for mandatory complaints procedure
Every client will soon be obliged to have a complaints procedure with
independent complaints desk. Entrepreneurs can thus better identify errors in a tender procedure and contracting authorities can correct them in time. There will also be more extensive and clear motivations for award decisions and additional opportunities for entrepreneurs in appeal cases.
In the run-up to the necessary amendment to the Procurement Act, the Ministry of Economic Affairs has now published a so-called guideline to prepare contracting authorities for the amendment to the law. With this, contracting authorities can already make a start with the professionalization of their complaints desk. In this way, a professional relationship between entrepreneur and contracting authority can be further built.
On average, Dutch municipalities spend almost half of their budget on the purchase of, for example, green maintenance, public lighting or street signs. That is why the government has been focusing on improving tendering practices in recent years. This will take place in addition to this package of measures with (the follow-up program of) Better Procurement, which will improve practice and improve the dialogue between governments and entrepreneurs.