Optimising Local Government Procurement During COVID-19 and Beyond: Lessons From the Crisis, 2020-2022

These data were generated as part of a fifteen month ESRC-funded research project ‘Optimising Outcomes from Procurement and Partnering for COVID-19 and Beyond: Lessons from the Crisis’ (Nov 2020 – Feb 2022; ESRC ref: ES/V015842/1) examining how local authorities responded to the COVID-19 crisis through their commissioning and procurement. Viewing procurement as a ‘lever’ to optimise outcomes, it examined how this might be strengthened through strategic, entrepreneurial, data-led and relational enablers to deliver both desired outcomes for communities (‘procurement as governance’) and intermediate procurement outcomes (‘governance of procurement’). The study considered all four nations of the UK. Transcripts comprise interviews with stakeholders from local government (n=53), central government (n=14), private sector (n=17), and third sector (n=18). A survey of local government officers (N=205) involved in commissioning and procurement was developed to gather data on the response from local government to the COVID-19 crisis in terms of their procurement activity. Two further surveys (N= 602 and N=212) were developed to gather data on the response from UK local government suppliers to the COVID-19 crisis.