HUP is asking for significant changes in public procurement
Croatian Employers’ Association held a press conference in Zagreb on March 29, 2016, in order to present their suggestions of the most important changes and additions to the Public Procurement Act. All suggested changes should ensure better transparency and efficiency of the entire system. The entire document was already given to the Minister of Economy Tomislav Panenić and all other representatives of the Ministry.
The primary goal of the proposed changes and additions is to protect both public and private interest, in other words, to ensure more efficient use of public funds. In order to seriously tackle this problem and offer a broad spectrum of solutions to problems encountered by buyers and suppliers, HUP (Croatian Employers’ Association) fo9rmed a working group back in 2014 which included 40 experts and representatives of large, medium and small businesses from both private and public companies. They also worked with representatives of cities and counties, considering they all participate in the public procurement process.
The document which was sent to the Minister and Ministry representatives includes EU directives that have the aim to simplify and lower the cost of the public procurement system. It consists of 4 sections - institutions, actions by all parties involved, legal actions and suggestions of new solutions in the public procurement system. Document points out three major problems in the current system: inefficient implementation of the “best value for money offer” principle, lack of efficient control and insufficient transparency.
Davor Majetić, director of the Croatian Employers’ Association stated: “ By including all segments of our economy and the public system into our working group, we ensured maximum representation during the completion of this document, giving it validity and legitimacy. Croatian public procurement system is worth over 40 billion kunas per year so it is crucial that it is efficient and transparent. We have submitted this document to the Ministry of Economy and we expect it to be the foundation of the upcoming amendment to the Public procurement Act”.
Some of the more important changes suggested by the Croatian Employers’ Association, along with the need for better implementation of the “Best offer” principles, are as follows:
1. Better implementation of the current Framework agreement since current proactice, in which buyer is signing a Framework agreement with one supplier for a 2 year period or with several suppliers for 4 years (Even though the Act itself does provide the option for longer periods), larger investments are hindered which in the end makes the service more expensive for the buyer
2. Precise clarification of the institute of professional discount and further education to entice its use.
3. More detailed definition of the term “unusually low prices” which is very often used to disrupt the market; this segment requires the education of buyers and sector specialisation of suppliers. Furthermore, implementation of the “Best offer” practice is necessary as well as the obligation to conduct market research.
4. Internal acts on public procurement which do not fall under the Public Procurement Act (so called petty purchases) have to be made public either on their website or in some other appropriate way.
5. Urgent deduction of administrative actions required in every public procurement procedure since the both slow down the procedure and make it more expensive. .
6. Reclamation periods – start of a reclamation period should be after the offers are opened; the obligation of DKOM is to inform all interested parties of the exact date of reclamation through its website, considering that is the date when the 30 day period for DKOM’s decision will start. .
Both Croatian Employers’ Association and entrepreneurs are in favour of better use of e-procurement, since they believe if the entire procedure can be performed online it would be more transparent, and as far as other suggestions go, they also stated they’re in favour of better implementation of green and innovative public procurement.
