Significant changes to public procurement law are being proposed under draft legislation prepared by the Public Procurement Office.

Although the project is still under discussion, the most important changes may include:

  • implementing EU law on coordinating procurement procedures for certain types of contract in the defence and security sectors;
  • introducing the institution of technical dialogue;
  • limiting the right to participate in the same tender of contractors who are dominant over/dependent on each other, or those who share their know-how and appoint the same sub-contractor, unless they can show it doesn't affect fair competition and isn't a form of prohibited bid-rigging;
  • requiring contracting authorities in the utilities sector to comply with fair competition, equal treatment and transparency rules in contracts which are not or not fully subject to the provisions of the Public Procurement Directives;
  • changing the value of the financial penalty that can be imposed by the President of the Public Procurement Office.

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The original publication date for this article was 23/12/2010.