The influential U.K.-based think-tank, the Adam Smith Institute, claims the U.K.’s public procurement rules, emphasising ‘social values’, are costing taxpayers billions and hindering economic growth. The Express has more.
The top Westminster research centre, the Adam Smith Institute (ASI), has said that little-known public procurement rules are costing taxpayers billions, and hampering much-needed economic growth.
New research by the think-tank has revealed that a ‘woke’ law that prioritises ‘social values’ over value-for-money is costing the British taxpayer billions more than equivalent economies.
Public procurement costs the Treasury coffers £379 billion a year, well above the OECD average.
The ASI’s new paper – ’The Price of Everything, the Social Value of Nothing’ – has focused the spotlight on these little-known rules holding back the British economy.
A law introduced by the Coalition Government in 2012 called ‘The Social Value Act’ proscribes thirty pages of criteria that businesses, regardless of their size, must adhere to.
Rather than civil servants awarding contracts based on an obvious value-for-money basis, firms must instead be able to prove their business tackles economic inequality, dedicates staff to “protect and improve” the environment, and uses costly cybersecurity licensure – even for non-tech firms.
The latest Social Value model used by the Government sets out five primary themes that must be “tackled” through procurement: COVID-19 recovery, economic inequality, climate change, equal opportunity and well-being.
The ASI has now said the rules must be scrapped, in order to save taxpayers large amounts of cash and get the economy growing in the most efficient way possible.
Maxwell Marlow, the report’s author, says current rules unfairly disadvantages small and medium-sized British businesses, adding costs and delays on to suppliers, and gives no accountability to taxpayers.
Mr. Marlow slams the rules as smelling “of a cynical attempt to change businesses to get its ‘values’”.
Worth reading in full, as is the full Adam Smith Institute paper.
To join in with the discussion please make a donation to The Daily Sceptic.
Profanity and abuse will be removed and may lead to a permanent ban.
Yet another Conservative government responsibility.
Coalition Government ….. Clegg’s fingerprints all over it.
I’m beginning to think I might be OK with this shite because, let’s face it, the sooner they go broke, and the crap hits the fan….perhaps our sensible re-set can go ahead?….I mean they always say when ‘hunger comes through the door, love flies out the window’…maybe they just need to get to rock-bottom, like alcoholics, before they can get better??
I appreciate this will affect us all..but sometimes you just have to pull the plaster off…or maybe this is our Battle of Britain moment..to help future generations….?
Or maybe it’s the bottle of wine talking….?? LOL!!
Like you, I and many have said, things have to get a lot worse before they will start getting better…
It’s only when people are starving that things change. And then they do change, for sure, but for all the wrong reasons – so the outcome usually produces another type of hell.
But my message is not negative, far from it: let the sheep be sheep, just have an eye for their tendency every so often to go completely crazy, en masse.
The light shines out from within individuals who will be free (anarchic). That light will light your way, and be a guide for those who are searching for the light.
By the way, this is not meant as a religion. It’s the opposite. The church has never supported this message. It’s just another of those blasted power structures (which keeps the sheep as sheep, and paying sheep, at that).
I know (almost) everyone here knows this, just for the record
I concur 100%, but I’d concur a bit more if you and Mr Gum would be so kind as to replicate this experiment and then get back to us with your findings. I do believe it would be advantageous to the group in the long run! P.S Perhaps try ‘best of 5’, though it could be deemed unethical…
https://twitter.com/buitengebieden/status/1687824144279261184
Let them go broke – but not us! Don’t let them waste our money and resources. The best way to do that is not to let them take it in the first place. Don’t comply!
Sensible reset? Are you high?
Haven’t you heard of the NWO?.
We’ll go broke funding it before they do
‘Proscribe’ is to ban or outlaw, prohibit. Perhaps the author means ‘prescribes’.
According to an internal Philip Morris report, a series of ASI proposals have become policy and been enacted into law. These include:8
Who funds ASI?
This is one of the reasons I have taken the personal decision to (legally) reduce the tax I pay as much as possible. It’s meant re-organising my life along simpler lines and reducing my voluntary spend.
Starve the beast.
I’m quite enjoying depriving the Government of as much of my money as I can.
It has long been known that public sector procurement is utterly hopeless.
“Public procurement costs the Treasury coffers £379 billion a year”
No. It costs the taxpayer £379 billion a year. Indeed, the whole public sector is rapidly becoming an horrendous drain on the taxpayer, with more going in for less and less.
Heaven help us – because this government , nor the next, won’t!