Public Procurement Act in 2015 (?)

Czech Republic: The implementation of new procurement directives of the European Parliament and of the Council in Czech law

After several years of discussions, new European procurement directives (2014/24/EU and 2014/25/EU) were finally adopted at the beginning of 2014. These new rules for the procurement of public contracts must be implemented in the national law of member states no later than by 18 April 2015.

To this end, the ministry for regional development has begun work on a completely new Public Procurement Act. The current draft of the new law may still be expected to undergo various revisions (not only to reflect the outcome of discussions with the professional community, but also because of political „wish lists”); even so, this is the time to alert you to certain future changes which are rooted in the above-mentioned new procurement directives.

One aspect that deserves mentioning is the shortening of deadlines in tender procedures. In the case of an open procedure organized by a public contracting authority, the deadline for submitting bids is being reduced from 52 days to 35 days. In the case of a restricted procedure organized by a public contracting authority, the minimum period for submitting bids is 30 days (compared to 40 days today). However, contracting authorities will still have to adhere, as they must now, to the proportionality principle which in the case of deadlines entails that the contracting authority must set the deadlines for submitting bids such as to make it objectively possible to put together and submit a viable bid.

In the future, only the winning bidder would have to evidence the fulfillment of the selection criteria. Bidders (or candidates) would furnish their bid (or their request for participation) with a mere representation (affidavit) according to which they satisfy the required qualitative selection criteria, as opposed to the entire relevant documentation (compare the current rules for simplified procedures for procuring below-threshold contracts).

We should also mention the enhanced option to disqualify a bidder from participation if it has proven unreliable or even fails to comply with its statutory duties, or if it engages in grave professional misconduct that calls its integrity into question.

Sources:
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/CS/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:32014L0024&rid=1
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/CS/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:32014L0025&rid=1

David Fechtner, Associate

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