Editorial: one in thirty procurements contested

Photo: Urmas Luik / Pärnu Postimees

Not limited to challenges to definite public procurements, rules thereof have undergone loads of debates more general by nature. Since 2007, when Public Procurements Act was passed, for various reasons it has been amended for a whopping fifteen times.

Continually, many are the problems also triggering wider public interest – whether the ferryboat connection to islands, waste transport firms versus Tallinn, or the huge road building gigs in years past. It’s not all okay. Even so, to claim all is wrong would also be an exaggeration.

Over the years, the ratio of challenges has remained basically the same – on the average, one in thirty is contested (as allowed regarding procurement documents and decisions by procurers). So: 96 percent of public procurements have been organised in a way that participants have found no fault – or have not deemed these worthy of the costly and complex debate.

Embarrassing are the cases where debates challenge the completion of objects with deadlines. The right to challenge is there to guarantee equal treatment. If, drawing its plans, a public agency will not consider the potential delay due to challenges, they have planned bad. Indeed, weeping about how the wicked challengers are threatening their important goals may indeed touch the emotional and the nervous, but is rather a sign of incompetence at the agencies. 

Clearly, over these past years, procurements by Tallinn environmental and utilities departments are contested the most. S for enterprises, AS Eesti Keskkonnateenused (environmental services) and AS Ragn Sells are the chief challengers. As by said procurements the market is divided for several years, obviously the companies will use any opportunity to gain market share. For the political level, the question is: in a Tallinn-sized town, is there any need to divide the trash transport market by procurements? Why not, rather, let the enterprises enter direct contracts with clients?