The London Borough of Waltham Forest continues to support local businesses by keeping its spend within the community. In 2007/08 the Council spent over £54m with local suppliers, aiming to increase this to over £56m by 2011, offering local companies the chance to gain some of the Council’s contracts and retaining more wealth within the borough.
As part of their sustainable community strategy, an agreement between the Council’s Procurement team and ELBP will help bring together buyers and suppliers. The Council will now be requiring all managers to seek at least one quote from a local supplier where the value of the work is between £5,000 and £75,000.

ELBP will assist them in sourcing local suppliers and third sector organisations and will help improve advertising of Council tender opportunities within the community and among ELBP’s membership. ELBP also work to get local suppliers ‘fit to bid’ through regular workshops, and can provide updates on level of spend with local companies in order that this can be measured and tracked.

“For some time LBWF has been pushing local business to appoint a sourcing organisation to support the Council in its goal to increase the percentage of work bid for and awarded to local business.
The involvement and experience of ELBP will play a vital role in helping us to achieve our objectives.”

Tony Jain
Interim Head of Procurement
London Borough of Waltham Forest