DPA contracts

73/11
25 October 2011
MPA briefing paper 73/2011

This briefing paper has been prepared to inform members and staff. It is not a committee report and no decisions are required.

General Background on Procurement Activity

At the Authority meeting on 16 September, issues were raised in respect to contracts approved by Dick Fedorcio, Director of Public Affairs and Internal Communications.

This briefing provides information on DPA contracts in the context of the programme of work being undertaken by the Service to improve contract compliance and governance.

Under MPA/MPS Standing Orders and Schemes of Delegation, procurement with a value of more than £50,000 is dealt with by Procurement Services in liaison with the relevant sponsoring directorate. Procurement with a value of less than £50,000 is dealt with by the relevant Business Group.

In 2008 Management Board commissioned Developing Resource Management (DRM) and brought together a number of existing and new workstreams focused on improving governance in the MPS. This programme included a number of projects relating to procurement activity aimed at establishing and maintaining compliance on all MPS contracts. One of the projects, ‘Contract Compliance Management’, aims to:

• Baseline all corporate contracts (over £50K) and upload into a corporate contracts register.
• Put in place system of controls to help reduce non contract expenditure
• Assess contract compliance.
• Agree and complete a programme to
  • move all contracts in excess of £50,000 to a compliant state;
  • establish appropriate corporate contracts where the value of local purchases, when added together, exceeded £50,000.

In terms of managing risk, the initial focus of the project was on dealing with contracts of over £50,000 and regular updates have been provided to the MPA Resources and Productivity Sub-Committee.

Further policies and systems have been introduced to help reduce non-compliance on local purchases of less than £50,000. In June 2011 CompeteFor was made mandatory for all purchases between £500 and £50,000. CompeteFor is a free web-based portal which matches buyers with suppliers and allows quotations to be received electronically which can offer significant long-term savings, as well as boosting opportunities among small and diverse businesses. CompeteFor is a LDA funded initiative.

From October 1st 2011 the MPS will operate a No Purchase Order No Pay policy which will further help to reduce non compliant expenditure. These initiatives will be completed by March 2012.

Against this background it can be difficult to collate historic data on local contract activity.

DPA Procurement Activity

Procurement activity in DPA is managed by the Assistant Directors based on briefs agreed with the Director or Deputy Director of Public Affairs.

Having considered local procurement activity over recent years, two instances have been identified where the Director was personally involved in the sourcing of two local projects which were awarded to Chamy Media Ltd and Alternative Genius.

Chamy Media Ltd:

• Chamy Media, owned by Neil Wallis, former Executive Editor of the News of the World, was appointed to provide strategic communication advice and support to the MPS, including advice on speech writing and PR activity, while the Met’s Deputy Director of Public Affairs was on extended sick leave recovering from a serious illness.
• The procurement of this contract is now part of an investigation by the IPCC.

Alternative Genius:

• This work related to additional budget identified for marketing in 2009/10 and focused on developing a marketing plan for the MPS to contribute to the 10% uplift in public confidence in the MPS.
• The work was carried out between December 2009 and June 2010 and involved reviewing existing material, research and brand guidelines, designing and holding workshops and communication with stakeholders across the Service, carrying out stakeholder interviews, supporting planning and development of a new marketing brand, developing recommendations for communication planning, developing creative concepts in conjunction with DPA and HR advertising and media buying agencies, informing research projects, developing an MPS marketing scorecard in order to evaluate the new programme of work and producing a strategy document.
• The value of the assignment was £20,000 and actual payments totalled £18,000.
• The DPA papers supporting this procurement have been passed to DARA for review.

DARA activity

DARA have agreed with the IPCC that they will not progress their work on DPA procurement activity until the IPCC have concluded their investigation on the Chamy Media Ltd contract.

Author: Anne McMeel
Director of Resources 25 October 2011

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