SEC welcomes government action on supply chains with new measures
Construction body the Specialist Engineering Contractors’ (SEC) Group has welcomed the Government’s announcement today that they will be introducing a package of measures to support SMEs supplying to government.
SEC Group’s CEO, Rudi Klein, says that he was particularly pleased that the Government intends to exclude poor payers from government procurement. He says: “We have been urging the Government to introduce a yellow/red card system for a long time. The yellow card is a warning to improve payment performance and the red card excludes a continuing poor performer from bidding for government contracts for a period of 2 to 3 years.”
Klein says that if such a system had already been in place Carillion would have been excluded from government contracts. However, SEC Group believes that on payment security the Government needs to go further, including project bank accounts for all public sector projects; and supporting the Aldous Bill.
SEC Group also welcomes action by the Prime Minister in urging departments to nominate a minister as Small Business Champion. Klein adds: “The Carillion debacle has revealed the appalling level of abuse heaped on construction supply chains. We should also be considering the introduction of a statutory regulator (similar to the Groceries Code Adjudicator) to challenge the behaviour of large firms and, if necessary, fine them in the worst cases of abuse.”
