UK rethinks offshoring ban for £8M online procurement system

Cabinet Office signals it might let supplier ship work abroad after 'unforeseeable' event

The UK government has signaled its intention to allow a supplier providing maintenance to its online procurement platform to subcontract offshore, having previously said that this was off-limits due to security concerns.

A notice said the variation to an £8 million contract would be negotiated without a prior call for competition because of the "extreme urgency brought about by events unforeseeable for the contracting authority."

If the Cabinet Office, which ran the competition to support the Central Digital Platform (CDP), an online procurement notice and tendering system, allowed the offshoring of subcontractor work, it would contradict several stipulations in the original contract, which was a call-off from a framework agreement.

In April, the Cabinet Office published a notification saying that Goaco Group Ltd had been awarded the deal to support and maintain the CDP, a service where all UK contracting authorities publish information relating to procurement.

In a notice published earlier this month, the Cabinet Office declared its "intention to vary [the contract] to allow for the offshoring of subcontractor resources to provide advisory support for ongoing continuous improvement activities under contract." It added that "all other actual and deliverables remain with Goaco Group Limited."

In the initial contract award, the "call-off" document specified that "all work must be completed within the UK, offshoring of any work will not be permitted."

In the document, the Cabinet Office said it had assessed the contract "as a higher-risk agreement." It stipulated that the supplier must complete the "Secure by Design Questionnaire," which says that the supplier and subcontractors "may store, access or handle government data in... the United Kingdom only." Support and development were also specified for "the United Kingdom only."

A Cabinet Office spokesperson said: "No offshoring has occurred. As part of our commitment to transparency, we have published a notice to the market of the proposed change.

"Suppliers have a right to respond to the notice and provide us their views, no final decisions have been made and we would not comment further ahead of the notice deadline."

The Cabinet Office confirmed that the notice regarding offshoring was published following a request from Goaco. The company declined to comment.

Procurement professionals involved in senior government roles told The Register that failed bidders for the contract might feel aggrieved that offshoring rules had changed since they competed for the work, but would be unlikely to challenge the decision for fear of missing out on later work.

Under the previous Conservative government, projections in 2022 said ongoing running costs for the CDP would be £1.5 million a year from 2024/25 to 2030/31. The plan was to "develop new platform capability which will provide suppliers with a single portal to provide information and integrate existing systems."

Goaco's £8 million deal runs from April 2025 until April 2027, while a separate £17 million contract was awarded to consultancy EY to be a "Digital Delivery Partner for the CDP" from February 2025 to the same month in 2027, making annual costs around £4 million.

The Cabinet Office said scope of the CDP had changed under the current government: "The CDP is a wider program transforming the delivery of multiple government commercial services, including [procurement websites] Find a Tender Service and Contracts Finder." ®