The Metropolitan Police – purchasing recycled content products
Example of:
How good procurement practices can help improve sustainability
Key points:
As their contracts come up for re-tendering, the Metropolitan Police build recycling requirements into the specifications.
- The Metropolitan Police has been able to negotiate prices very close to those for similar products without environmental specifications.
As part of its Environmental Strategy, the Metropolitan Police is committed to purchasing recycled content products. Its target for 2006/07 was to increase spend on recycled products by 5 per cent on 2004/2005 levels.
As procurement contracts came up for re-tendering during the period 2004/05 to 2006/07, the sustainability manager took the opportunity to build in environmental requirements as part of the Invitation to Tender and contract specification. Where sustainability elements were thought to have a significant cost/value for money impact to the Facilities Management Service contract, these elements were included as quoting options, to enable the MPS to evaluate effectively. The majority of environmental requirements were cost neutral as part of the contract negotiation. In addition, all current MPS contracts were reviewed to identify where materials with recycled content were utilised and what opportunities there were for increasing there use. This process helped the Metropolitan Police to achieve a 170 per cent increase in recycled content products, well above the 5 per cent target. The MPS continues to work with the GLA Sustainable Procurement steering and working groups to identify opportunities and participates in the Mayor’s Green Procurement Code.
There was a perception that including requirements to minimise environmental impact and use more environmentally sound alternatives (such as recycled content) would have a significant impact on the cost of the contract, and may not represent best value for the MPS. However, by involving the sustainability team in negotiations from an early stage, the eventual price was very similar to what it would have been had the requirements not been specified.