Public Procurement Contracts
Seanad Éireann — 2026-01-20
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Linda Nelson Murray (FG), Industrial and Commercial Panel

I thank the Minister of State. I welcome that there has been a first national public procurement strategy. I note the Department launched an extensive consultation exercise last year. I am interested to know where that report is; I have not seen it. I know it will form part of the strategy going forward but I would like to have a look at that report. Will the Minister of State supply me with information from that afterwards? To reiterate, for businesses, the tendering process is complex and bureaucratic. It has high administrative costs - preparing a compliant tender can be costly and require legal, financial and technical input. For SMEs, these upfront costs can be a deterrent - the scale and turnover requirements, insurance requirements and over-emphasis on price - sometimes the cheapest is not the best. I would welcome being able to look at the report. We still have SMEs saying it is too difficult to enter the public procurement tendering process especially for Government contracts but I am happy we are working on this. I look forward to it being a lot easier for businesses to tender in the near future.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-01-20/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:31+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-01-20