The House of Commons has been called on to reduce the length of the government’s procurement processes.

Labour MP Meg Hillier spoke has called for “serious step change in how contracts are drawn up”, saying that the length of procurement processes in the public sector was impacting performance and putting off SMEs.

The comments made in the House of Commons called for similar lengths for procurement processes as achieved by governments in the U.S. and Sweden, which typically take between 7 and 12 weeks.

Meg Hillier also criticised an on-going two-and-a-half year contract for the Ministry of Justice, were the procurement processes is still uncompleted.

In defence of the government’s procurement record, Nick Hurd, Cabinet Office minister for civil society, said that the average procurement process had been reduced by 40 per cent, making the UK’s procurement process faster than European counterparts.

Public sector procurement facing ‘crisis of confidence’

Wales launches National Procurement Service