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Transforming Public Procurement - The Procurement Act 2023
The Cabinet Office is leading the Transforming Public Procurement programme, introducing changes to the way that goods, works and services are procured by the public sector.
In March 2024, the Procurement Regulations 2024 were laid in Parliament, and as of 24 February 2025, the new Procurement Act 2023 went live.
To support contracting authorities, suppliers, and anyone working in public procurement to understand the changes, the Cabinet Office prepared Procurement Act 2023 guidance documents that include technical guidance and help with interpreting and understanding the Act.
What happened on 24 February 2025?
Any procurement commenced on or after this date will be undertaken in accordance with the Procurement Act 2023. This means making use of the new Notices required under the Act and publishing information on the Central Digital Platform (CDP), based on the previous Find a Tender Service (FTS) platform.
If your business supplies goods, works or services to organisations in the public sector, the Government Commercial Function prepared a short guide for suppliers explaining the key changes.
What has happened to the Public Contract Regulations 2015?
The new Act does not apply retrospectively to any agreements entered into under the Public Contract Regulations 2015, these regulations will continue to apply to those agreements.
This means that you can continue to call-off from our existing framework agreements under PCR regulations until they expire.
How to learn more
The Government Commercial Function prepared a series of knowledge drops for contracting authorities and suppliers to provide an overview of the changes to the procurement regulations.
It also has a dedicated information and guidance for suppliers area that includes video guides on how to register for the Central Digital Platform.
You can also access the Procurement Specific Questionnaire (PSQ) template on the Procurement Pathway Tool and on the Government Commercial College platform.
The PSQ helps contracting authorities receive core supplier information (from the central digital platform), additional exclusions and debarment information, and information relating to conditions of participation. The guidance also includes a glossary and handy ‘explainer’ for suppliers.
How we’ve prepared for the change
As a supplier to the public sector, all of our procurement practitioners are fully trained in the new Act. We have made the required changes to our processes and documentation, including our tender packs, which have been amended to reflect the new regulations.
This ensures we continue to deliver compliant services and can provide high quality support to our procurement customers in embedding the Procurement Act within their organisations.
The introduction of the Act is the biggest change in public procurement for a number of years and it’s an exciting time to work in this environment; we welcome the increased clarity and transparency the Act brings.
If you need support, please reach out using the form at the bottom of this page – our team are happy to help you on this journey.
The National Procurement Policy
This month the National Procurement Policy Statement (NPPS) and a range of new Procurement Policy Notes (PPNs) were released, setting out the strategic priorities that contracting authorities across the public sector will need to meet.
The key things that you need to know are:
- Achieving value for money is always the overarching priority in public procurement, optimising the use of public funds by balancing effectiveness, efficiency and economy over the lifecycle of the procurement
- Contracting authorities should drive economic growth and strengthen supply chains by giving SMEs and VCSEs a fair chance at public contracts, creating high quality jobs and championing innovation
- Contracting authorities should deliver social and economic value that supports the government’s missions, including by working in partnership across organisational boundaries
- Contracting authorities should ensure the right commercial capability and standards are in place to procure and manage contracts effectively and to collaborate with other contracting authorities to deliver best value
How we can support
Suppliers that are new to the NHS or are delivering a new product/service can present a risk if due diligence isn’t done.
Our framework agreements prioritise sustainable practices and offer innovative solutions from a wide range of pre-qualified suppliers, including SMEs. This means you can procure the latest technology, products and services without worrying about compliance, and be assured patient safety and care delivery won’t be negatively impacted.
Collaborating across NHS organisations results in greater value for money and efficiencies across the supply chain, but not all teams have the in-house capability to do this in a cost-effective and timely way.
We can run compliant bespoke procurements and projects at both Trust and ICS level on your behalf, and if you want to upskill teams in the process, we can support with training too, saving you time and money.
Keeping track of suppliers’ social and economic outputs is challenging as the NHS supply chain is vast, but to deliver true social and economic value as a contracting authority, you need to focus on the supply chain.
The suppliers on our framework agreements are required to comply with specific social and economic policies, and through our Carbon Mapping Specialist Service, we can work with you to map carbon emissions across your supply chain – sometimes known as “Scope 3” emissions.
To find out more about how we can support you to meet the strategic priorities in the NPPS, get in touch.
Provider Selection Regime
On 1 January 2024 the Health Care Services (Provider Selection Regime) Regulations 2023 were implemented.
PSR is applicable to the following relevant authorities in England:
- NHS England
- Integrated care boards (ICBs)
- NHS trusts and NHS foundation trusts
- Local authorities and combined authorities
When procuring health care services, or completing mixed procurements where the main element is health care services, relevant authorities must use PSR regulations.
NHS England has created PSR statutory guidance, as well as toolkits, to support relevant authorities procure compliantly.
Our framework agreements
You can still utilise our wide range of healthcare service framework agreements under PSR.
The PSR recognises that there are existing framework agreements established under the PCR 2015 which deal with the procurement of health care services, therefore, such framework agreements remain a compliant route to market under the PSR until their expiry date.
Call-off guidance can be downloaded below. For more information on which framework agreements are in scope, please contact the team: nsbs.health@nhs.net
PSR training
If you need support to navigate the PSR, our team can work with you to deliver training sessions tailored to your needs.
We recently supported Greater Manchester Integrated Care Board (GM ICB), a large ICB with a significant number of contracts due to expire in the first quarter of 2024, which were subject to new PSR rules on expanding/replacing the contracts.
Learning how to apply PSR in time for the expiry of contracts was proving challenging, so our team delivered three training sessions to GM ICB which included:
- An introduction to PSR
- A walk through and explanation of the decision-making process
- A focus on key issues that may occur. For example, Direct Award Process C, which allows a commissioner to award a contract to an existing provider based on a key set of criteria, can often come with challenges around the evidence required, as well as the application of the ‘Considerable Change Threshold’
We delivered a further training session six months later too, so that lessons learned could be shared to further knowledge in this area.
We have also supported Lancashire and South Cumbria ICB with training for their primary care commissioning committee, so they had a basic understanding of the application of PSR, with a focus on its relevance to primary care contracts.
To find out how we can support you, get in touch using the form below.
“NHS SBS has worked closely with our ICB providing specialist procurement advice and delivery support for a critical service contract. The knowledge, dedication and service quality from the team has been excellent, giving full confidence in us achieving an optimal and compliant outcome. NHS SBS has also provided us with crucial advice and training to help prepare for the Provider Selection Regime. I would not hesitate to recommend NHS SBS as a strategic procurement partner.”
Professor Craig Harris
Chief of Strategy, Commissioning & Integration
Lancashire & South Cumbria ICB
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