News story: Crown Commercial Service Annual Report and Accounts Published

The report shows £12.4 billion of common goods and services are now being procured through CCS, whose aim is to become the ‘go to’ provider for the procurement of common goods and services across the entire public sector.

During the year, CCS – an executive agency of the Cabinet Office – has delivered £430 million in commercial benefits including savings for central government, and £295 million for the wider public sector – helping to deliver more efficient, effective public services that meet the needs of citizens.

Thousands more small and medium-sized businesses are successfully bidding to become government suppliers, and 32 of the government’s largest suppliers have now signed the Prompt Payment Code – pledging to back small businesses by paying invoices on time.

Tony van Kralingen, Chair of CCS, said:

This is a very encouraging performance, led by Malcolm Harrison and his new team. We have exceeded our target for the delivery of commercial benefits to our customers in Central Government and the Wider Public Sector. We continue to build capability and deliver improvements to the quality of service that we offer.

Malcolm Harrison, Chief Executive Officer of CCS, said:

We have made encouraging progress in the past financial year, building on the solid foundations we laid during a thorough operational review which has seen us focus on where we can add greatest value for our customers.

By drawing on our deep commercial expertise and leveraging the purchasing power of our customers across the entire public sector, we have been able to deliver value for money for them, as well as for the nation, in meeting their business needs.

Looking forward, we intend to maintain our sharp focus on meeting our customers’ expectations, not least through continuing to improve customer service levels and making it easier for a broad spectrum of public sector bodies to access our deals.

Performance highlights for 2016/17 include:

• £12.4bn of public sector procurement spend channeled through our commercial arrangements including frameworks – £6bn from central government, £6.4bn from the wider public sector. This is an increase of £1.1bn compared to £11.3bn in 2015/16 on a like-for-like basis
• £430m commercial benefits including savings achieved for central government
• £295m commercial benefits including savings achieved for the wider public sector
• All 32 of the Government’s Strategic Suppliers have now signed the Prompt Payment Code
• Money spent directly with SMEs across the country via CCS frameworks has increased from £702m (2015/16) to £879m (2016/17)

To read the full report and accounts, visit the annual report and accounts web pages