Guidance

Raising standards: our ambition

This document outlines the Procurement Review Unit’s (PRU) ambitions, and how the new unit will support the Procurement Act 2023.

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Raising standards: our ambition (PDF)

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Details

The Procurement Review Unit (PRU) aims to:

* Improve the capability and practices of contracting authorities for the benefit of everyone involved in public procurement by ensuring compliance with the new procurement rules (and trade agreements) * Protect public procurement from suppliers that pose unacceptable risk

This will embed the changes introduced by the Procurement Act 2023 and subsequently contribute to the realisation of the programme benefits.

To deliver its aims effectively, the PRU is comprised of three services:

  • the existing Public Procurement Review Service (PPRS)
  • a new Procurement Compliance Service (PCS)
  • a new Debarment Review Service (DRS)

The PRU will ‘go-live’ when the new procurement regime goes live, in February 2025.

Our ambition is to raise standards in public procurement, driving accountability for contracting authorities and suppliers in the UK.

This will be achieved through:

  • Overseeing compliance to the new legislation and making recommendations if non-compliance occurs
  • Enhancing the services offered to suppliers by the PPRS, to maintain fairness within the public sector procurement landscape
  • Ensuring that only suitable suppliers can bid for public contracts, by implementing the debarment regime. This will include maintaining a central list of suppliers that must or may be excluded from procurements
  • Investigating and issuing recommendations for improvement to contracting authority practice on behalf of Ministers, and actively monitoring contracting authorities’ action plans

Updates to this page

Published 17 May 2024
Last updated 18 September 2024 + show all updates
  1. Updated the time frame for when the new procurement regime goes live

  2. First published.

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