No at-scale commercial and procurement capability service for local government

The Procurement Act 2023 (in force February 2025) rewrote the rules governing roughly a third of council spend, but the main training offer is the Government Commercial College's generic e-learning built for Whitehall, and the Government Commercial Function does not serve councils. Local Partnerships (the HM Treasury/LGA/Welsh Government joint venture) provides exactly the right kind of deployable commercial support but is small and fee-funded; purchasing consortia (ESPO, YPO) cover commodity buying, not complex contract management. NAO and PAC work repeatedly links council failures (Thurrock's investments, Woking's development deals) to absent commercial skills, and local government reorganisation now adds mass contract novation and re-procurement risk.

Councils transact tens of billions of pounds a year through contracts and commercial ventures. Capability gaps convert directly into failed regeneration deals, outsourcing disputes, unrealised Procurement Act benefits, and reorganisation transitions that destroy rather than release value.

A grant-funded expansion of Local Partnerships into a Local Government Commercial Service: regional commercial hubs, a contract-management academy, and deployable deal teams that councils can call on for high-value transactions and LGR novations. Sponsors: MHCLG with Cabinet Office/Government Commercial Function; LGA as co-owner.

// Build together: Counterparty: Local Partnerships and LGA to pilot deployable commercial teams and a contract-management academy; MHCLG grant scales it.

Tens of billions flow through council contracts where skills gaps caused real collapses and Local Partnerships could be scaled, but no dated trigger forces action this year.