London boroughs spend around £8 billion on purchasing goods and services from third parties and the London Procurement Strategy Board (LPSB) was formed by Leaders in 2010 to assess what opportunities exist to achieve greater savings by exploiting the significant purchasing power of London local government.
The LPSB acts as the governance board (when required) for London-wide procurement projects; reviews existing, and proposals for new, framework structures across London in order to support the development of a consistent and coherent approach; and provides a forum for sharing expertise, learning and good practice between London local authorities.
The board draws on the expertise of its membership which includes representatives from London Councils, the Society of London Treasurers, the London Procurement Network and sub-regional shared services groupings.
In 2015/16 work included:
- The continued sharing of contract and spend data through the London contracts register and spend analytics tools
- Delivering a regular London Procurement Newsletter to member boroughs
- Providing support and advice for a number of pan-London procurement projects including:
- Postal Services Collaboration – a framework contract agreed with 24 boroughs enabling significant purchasing influence to be exerted in contract and performance talks with Royal Mail. Generated savings of £1.2 million in 2015/16 and achieved finalist status at this year’s National GO Awards
- MSTAR 1 project – standardised pay rates for children’s social care agency staff across 17 boroughs. Has generated £14.5 million of savings from temporary agency spend since 2011.
- Supplier Chain Resilience Review Project - developing a toolkit and consolidated framework for supply chain resilience management. Involved 9 boroughs and partners Zurich Municipal – work is ongoing in 2016/17 (nominated for an Alarm Risk Award 2016 for partnership work).