Hot on the heels of this month's CPC news article about the planned Customer Engagement Events we have an update on the work CCS have been doing to find suitable locations and venues. From this we are now planning to hold one in Leeds (with details to be confirmed shortly) and one in London.

NAHT, ASCL and DfE would like to develop some guidance for Schools and Academies on good practice in recruiting Supply Teachers and working with Supply Teacher agencies. They would be keen to hear from you what that guidance should cover and more importantly, they’d like you to send through any advice, tips, good practice you could share with other Schools and Academies.

TradePoint (B&Q), one of our suppliers on the Tools, Fasteners, Fixings, Adhesives and Ironmongery framework is currently running a time limited offer on discontinued kitchen unit carcasses which may be of interest if you use them as part of a course.

CPC are currently inviting tenders for the new Academies Insurance Framework that will be due to commence upon expiry of the existing agreement on 1st July 2016. The opportunity for suppliers to express an interest is available at https://in-tendhost.co.uk/cpc/aspx/Home.

The Public Contracts Regulations 2015 introduced changes to the information that must be published in an OJEU Notice and required new forms, for example, the new contract notice and award notice for procurements falling under the Light Touch Regime.

In 2015 Inverclyde Council held a mini-competition for street lighting services under a framework agreement and awarded the contract to Amey Public Services LLP, however it was Amey OW Ltd that was party to the framework agreement. Lightways (Contractors) Ltd (not a supplier on the framework) challenged the award on the basis that this was unlawful direct award made without advertisement in the OJEU.

The new EU regulations proactively encourage increased engagement with SMEs which is something that CPC has always endeavored to do. On two frameworks recently carried out under the new EU regulations approximately a third of successful suppliers declared themselves an SME. We believe this is a positive indication that our tender process facilitates SME participation.

CPC are delighted to announce that we have been invited to present about UK Education Sector Procurement and to engage with suppliers at a Procurement Partnering Conference Event taking place in South Korea on 13th May. The aim of the conference is to promote engagement between UK and South Korean suppliers and manufacturers.

The project to set up a framework for working with Awarding Organisations is progressing well. In January the steering group ran a supplier day in London. A variety of suppliers attended either the morning or afternoon session and there was a great deal of discussion about the project which was been extremely valuable to the group.

Please see the fantastic results that have been achieved in the benchmarking exercises that have been carried out during January and February 2016.