Policy paper

Public procurement and competition: supporting growth and innovation

Two papers by the CMA on achieving more effective public procurement.

• From: Competition and Markets Authority
• Published: 8 September 2026

Documents

Public procurement in the national interest: Reflections from the CMA

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Public procurement in the national interest: Reflections from the CMA (print version)

PDF, 927 KB, 57 pages

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Rigged bids, real costs: a case for urgent action on bid rigging in UK public procurement

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Rigged bids, real costs: a case for urgent action on bid rigging in UK public procurement (print version)

PDF, 812 KB, 32 pages

Details

These reports explore the role of public procurement in the UK’s economic success and security.

‘Public procurement in the national interest: Reflections from the CMA’ lays out evidence and case studies of how government can use procurement more strategically to support growth, innovation and sovereignty. The paper brings together insights from CMA work and broad stakeholder engagement across: 

• civil engineering 
• cloud services
• defence
• the UK scale-up challenge
• bid rigging 

This work was supported by the CMA’s Growth and Investment Council.

‘Rigged bids, real costs: a case for urgent action on bid rigging in UK public procurement’ presents the CMA’s case for stronger action to tackle bid rigging in public procurement through better collection and use of data.

Read opening remarks by Sarah Cardell, delivered at the Innovation APPG on 8 September 2026: Public procurement in the national interest: Reflections from the CMA

Published 8 September 2026