§ Mr. Andrew GeorgeTo ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what legislative authority the Environment Agency has to market-test or contract-out its flood defence emergency and routine maintenance functions. [65094]
§ Mr. MorleyUnder Section 37(1)(a) of the Environment Act 1995, the Environment Agency may do anything which, in its opinion, is calculated to facilitate, or is conducive or incidental to, carrying out its functions. This would include the market testing or contracting out of its flood defence emergency and routine maintenance functions.
§ Mr. Andrew GeorgeTo ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what instructions(a) the Minister and (b) the Environment Agency has issued on the question of market testing or contracting out aspects of its flood defence work. [65093]
§ Mr. MorleyThe Government have not issued specific instructions to the Environment Agency about the market testing of its flood defence work. Rather, the Agency is consistently encouraged to continue to deliver improvements in efficiency, and market testing and contracting out feature among the measures that the Agency may wish to use to achieve its efficiency objectives.
The Agency's Financial Memorandum generally requires that all contracts for whatever function are designed to secure value for money and should be let on a competitive basis unless the Agency is satisfied there are good reasons to the contrary.
386WAlso, for flood defence capital works to be eligible for MAFF grant, the Agency is generally required to tender on a competitive basis as set out in the MAFF Grant Memorandum.
The Agency has issued internal instructions to implement the requirements of the Financial Memorandum and the MAFF Grant Memorandum.