month in review

UK public procurement in October 2021

6,953 UK public sector tenders and contract awards were published in October 2021 by 1,397 buying organisations, level with September 2021. 7.1% of those with a recorded route to market were awarded directly, without competition.

notices

6,953

buyers

1,397

named a winner

5,137

awarded directly

7.1%

median value

£100,000

most active buyers

who won most

biggest changes on September 2021

Change in the number of notices published, against the month before. Measured as an absolute change and shown only where it is at least ten notices — a buyer going from one notice to four is a 300% rise and means nothing.

buyer	September 2021	October 2021	change
Department for Education	265	56	-209
Defra Network eTendering Portal	250	126	-124
Ministry of Defence	140	245	+105
The University of Birmingham	14	102	+88
Department of Health and Social Care	184	99	-85
University of the West of England	9	61	+52
UK Research and Innovation	104	53	-51
FCDO Services	56	7	-49
Maritime and Coastguard Agency	76	35	-41
Birmingham Womens and Childrens NHS Foundation Trust	38	0	-38

what was bought

the biggest awarded contracts of October 2021

contract	buyer	won by	value
RM6263 Digital Specialist and Programmes	Crown Commercial Service	named in the notice	£4,000,000,000
TCP Concession	Transport for London	BAI Communications Ltd,	£2,000,000,000
Procurement of Criminal Legal Aid Services from 1 October 2022	The Legal Aid Agency	Multiple	£1,800,000,000
Supply of Tyres	BABCOCK INTERNATIONAL GROUP PLC	MICHELIN TYRE PUBLIC LIMITED COMPANY	£942,000,000
Fire Risk and Mitigation Works and Services	PROCURE PLUS HOLDINGS LIMITED	AB Building & Electrical Ltd +75	£910,000,000
Asbestos Removal Services	Great Places Housing Group Limited	Addison Green Limited	£470,000,000
Logistics Support Contract	MINISTRY OF DEFENCE	BABCOCK INTEGRATED TECHNOLOGY LIMITED	£250,000,000
Inland Border Facilities (IBF) Enduring Site Services Operator - SR727828024	H M Revenue & Customs	Sodexo Limited	£184,500,000
Integrated Healthcare Services to Thames Valley Prisons for NHS England and NHS Improvement South East	NHS SOUTH, CENTRAL AND WEST COMMISSIONING SUPPORT UNIT	Central and North West London NHS Foundation Trust +1	£120,112,205
Restructuring and Insolvency	Crown Commercial Service	named in the notice	£120,000,000

Contracts published in October 2021 that name a winning supplier, ranked by the value the buyer published, excluding those flagged as a maximum rather than a price. Figures are as published; gvtcx does not adjust them. A large contract is often a multi-year framework, so the value is what may be spent over its whole life — and where several suppliers share one framework, each is shown against the framework's full value rather than its own share.

how this was counted

Notices published in October 2021 across Contracts Finder, Find a Tender, Public Contracts Scotland and Sell2Wales, under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Counts are of contracting processes, not published notices: a tender and its award notice are one contract and are counted once.

There is no total value on this page, deliberately. Published values repeat a framework's entire ceiling against every supplier on it, so a month containing one large framework would read as a spending spike that never happened. The median excludes anything flagged as a ceiling, and the reasoning is set out in full here. Where a total IS defensible — contracts awarded to a single supplier, with no framework — it is on the direct awards page.

A month stays open to revision: publishers backdate, so figures for the current month and the one before it may still move.