Best Value for Money for Public Procurement

Part of 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 1:59 pm on 5 February 2019.

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Photo of Mark Drakeford Mark Drakeford Labour 1:59, 5 February 2019

I thank David Rees for that. As he will know, following the difficulties in the steel industry back in 2016, a particular procurement note was produced for Welsh public buyers to make sure that we maximised the amount of Welsh steel that goes into the buildings and other infrastructure investment that is made on behalf of the public here in Wales. A whole series of things have been done, as the Member knows, to make sure that we extract not simply best value for money but best value in that wider sense.

The community benefits scheme in Wales now covers more than 500 schemes, and that has been very successful in making sure that local jobs, apprenticeships, training and spend on that wider set of community benefits are derived from the way in which public money is spent. Our code of practice on ethical employment in the supply chain was marked by an event in January that Ken Skates attended to celebrate 150 organisations in Wales signing up to that code, which is a real, practical example of that wider sense of how what we mean by best value can be found in the Welsh economy.