Tender bill moves on
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• Moves to force local authorities to put more services out to competitive tender were approved this week by MPs. The Local Government Bill was given a second reading despite strong opposition from Labour and Alliance MPs.
Under the terms of the Bill, services such as refuse collection, street cleaning and vehicle maintenance will have to be put out to tender.
Environment Secretary, Nicholas Ridley, said the government was not insisting that services should be privatised, but only that they be put out to tender. Despite previous warnings, councils had continued to provide poor quality services.
Ridley claimed that if the cost of the services the government wanted put out to tender were cut by 10%, it would save ratepayers 2300 million a year. He said the aim was to phase the change-in over three years.
Chief Labour spokesman, John Cunningham, however, said the Bill was just part of the Government's consistent attack of local government. All parties in local government were opposed to competitive tendering. Cost cuts were done by cutting wages rather than other costs. The market was dominated by two groups and in reality there would be no competition at all.