The Chambers Ireland has made the recommendation that a CompeteFor model should be used as a supply chain tool for the Office of Government Procurement in Ireland. The recommendation was made in the report “A strategic Public Procurement Policy for Ireland” by the Chambers, which looked at public procurement reforms.

The report highlighted that being part of a supply chain is a vitally important source of income for many micro-enterprises and SME’s, and argued that the government should consider introducing a system like CompeteFor to develop their supply chains. They pointed out the benefits of CompeteFor as a free service that enables businesses to compete for contracts and delivers sustainable community benefits by providing opportunities to local companies, with the aim of guaranteeing their survival and protecting local employment.

Additional suggestions were based around making the entire process of public procurement fully transparent to help suppliers understand why they have not been successful. CompeteFor aims to deliver transparency for all suppliers, giving them full visibility of supply chain opportunities in the public and private sector.

Further recommendations made were that the Office of Government Procurement in Ireland should be moved out of the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform into the Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation. The business representative group said it would be a symbolic and practical move to demonstrate that the long term priority for procurement is to stimulate the economy, employment and innovation, rather than just to save money.