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Paul Davis Speaks at NI Assembly Procurement Conference

27th October 2009

Mr Paul Davis, Lecturer in Management and Chair of the M.B.S. in Strategic Procurement at DCU Business School, spoke last week at a major conference, which brought together key players in public procurement on the island of Ireland.

The Northern Ireland Assembly Committee for Finance and Personnel on Tuesday 21st October piloted a new approach to evidence gathering as part of its Inquiry into Public Procurement Policy and Practice in Northern Ireland.

 


Mr Paul Davis of DCUBS, pictured second from left, at the recent Northern Ireland Assembly Public Procurement Stakeholder Conference

Around 100 participants, including local business representatives, procurement experts from across Ireland and the United Kingdom, and those involved in purchasing, joined the Committee at a specially arranged Stakeholder Conference at the Dunsilly Hotel, Antrim.

In Northern Ireland public procurement accounts for almost 25% of total public sector spend each year and amounts to around £2bn. Evidence the Committee has heard to date has highlighted a range of issues and barriers facing local Small and Medium Enterprises and Social Economy Enterprises as they try to access these contracts.

At the Stakeholder Conference Paul Davis delivered an insightful commentary, outlining two key areas on which public procurement should be concentrating. The first is the development of a licentiate approach, which would ensure that all public procurement professionals have recognition to do their job. The second is that short term environmental considerations have to be balanced against long term economic impact, in particular choosing a measure that favours local SME's in the short term but restricts their export growth in the long term.
 

Paul Davis is Chair of DCU’s M.B.S. in Strategic Procurement. This two-year part-time programme is the first programme of its kind in Ireland and one of only two such programmes in Europe. The programme builds the capacity for strategic thinking in procurement and aims to meet the changing skills requirements for professionals either engaged in or working closely with the procurement function.

View details of DCU’s M.B.S. in Strategic Procurement