The EU Commission has revised the Public Procurement Directive’s thresholds resulting in an increase in the thresholds for advertising in the Official Journal of the EU which comes into effect on 1 January 2012. The details are set out in the attached table. EU Thresholds for advertising in the Official Journal of the EU applicable from 1 January 2012.

References to EU thresholds have been updated in the following Guidance Notes to align with current EU thresholds which are effective from 1 January 2012 to 31 December 2013:

• GN 1.4 – Procurement Process for Works Contractors (v 1.0 – 10 May 2011)
• GN 1.5 – Public Works Contract (v1.2 – 31 March 2011)
• GN 1.6 – Procurement Process for Consultancy Services (Technical) (v1.1 – 23 March 2011)
• GN 1.6.1 – Suitability Assessment of Service Providers, Restricted Procedure (v1.0 – 23 March 2011)
• GN 1.6.2 – Suitability Assessment of Service Providers, Open Procedure (v1.1 – 23 March 2011)
• GN 2.3 – Procurement Process for Works Contractors (v 1.1 – 10 May 2011)
• GN 2.3.1 – Suitability Assessment of Works Contractors, Restricted Procedure (v1.0 – 28 January 2011)
• GN 2.3.2 – Suitability Assessment of Service Providers, Open Procedure (v1.0 – 28 January 2011)

Greater flexibility has been introduced in Section 3.3a Evidence of Turnover, which allows contracting authorities to decide on whether the turnover should be based on an average minimum or just a minimum.

The Value for Money and Policy Review of the Construction Procurement Reform Initiative Report, which was published on the Department of Finance’s website on 14 February 2011, is now available here.

Following the recent publication of the Term Maintenance and Refurbishment Works Contract, the Invitation to Tender; Instructions to Tenderer using the Restricted Procedure for Term Maintenance and Refurbishment Works Contracts; and Note to Employer, are now being published.

A separate Instruction to Tenderers using the Open Procedure for Works Contractors and the Short Form of Contract (ITTW4) has been developed.

•Appendices 7 and 8 (dated 04/11/2009) for PW-CF1 to PW-CF4 have been removed from the website and are included in the Schedules to PW-CF1 to PW-CF4 and FTS1 to FTS4 (dated 07/10/2011).
•An entry for ‘Plant’ is now included in Appendices 7 in (i) the Schedule to PW-CF3 and PW-CF4; and (ii) the Schedule in Form of Tender to PW-CF 3 and PW-CF4.

The Term Maintenance and Refurbishment Works Contract is a new addition to the suite of public works contracts published as part of the Capital Works Management Framework. While it is different to the other forms of public works contracts (PW-CF1 to PW-CF6) in that it is not a fixed price lump sum contract, it adheres to the key principle on which all the Government contracts are based.

Minor changes have been made to the Schedules in relation to insurance to reflect what is available in the market following discussions with Insurance Brokers.

A short amendment has been made to Section 2.6 (Page 50) of GN 2.2 v 1.1 (dated 29 September 2011) to incorporate text that had been included in an earlier guidance document (CWMF Guidance Notes 16 and 17 Technical).

A minor amendment has been made to the first signature box.