Abstract

TELLES, Pedro. Direct award and prior consultation: everything needs to change, so everything can stay the same. e-Pública [online]. 2017, vol.4, n.2, pp.47-66. ISSN 2183-184X.

The Portuguese Revised Public Contracts Code misses an opportunity to change the paradigm of how public contracts valued at below EU thresholds are awarded. This paper argues that the changes for low value contracts, where the direct award was replaced for some contracts by the prior consultation procedure (request for quotes) amount to little more than window dressing. This is problematic since 90.2% of all public contracts in Portugal are awarded via direct award, meaning 47.9% all public procurement expenditure is not subject to transparency. As the lack of transparency in low value public contracts is associated with procurement risks such as corruption, strategic behaviour by contracting authorities and bidders or lack of accountability, it is apparent the recent public procurement reform did not really address the behaviours behind these risks. Portugal could have instead improved transparency in low value contracts by adapting already existing provisions within its legal framework, or following the footsteps of the Public Contracts Regulations 2015 (England and Wales) and the Draft Public Sector Contracts Law (Spain) which introduced significant transparency reforms for low value contracts. Although, there is room for improvement on these, either solution would have provided a marked improvement in the regulation of low value public contracts in Portugal.

Keywords : public procurement; financial thresholds; EU law; Directive 2014/24/EU; corruption; direct award; prior consultation; Spain; United Kingdom.

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