That there are bad things going on in procurement is sometimes obvious, but the same tactics are available to all the players.

Surely this Directive is just going to cause endless litigation by the losers, regardless of whether the contract award was fair or not? After all, how easy is it to prove which is the 'best' offer, and what should be taken into account in making the decision?

It seems typical that rather than fix the existing system, new legislation is introduced which makes more money for the lawyers without actually solving the original problem.

Contracts, procurement and related delays already feel like more than 50% of the time to implement any major new system at this Local Authority... Another round of delays will be just wonderful...

So this is the way to improve public services - slow everything down, increase litigation costs and always award the contact to the biggest kid on the block.

If all relevant bids were made public then maybe this stand still period will make sense other wise it's just another case of lets screw the tax payers.