Question to the Cabinet Office:

To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of the implementation of the Government Functional Standard for procurement.

The effectiveness and implementation of the Government Functional Standard for Commercial (GovS 008) is assessed through the Commercial Continuous Improvement Assessment Framework (CCIAF). The CCIAF provides a structured framework that allows government departments and wider public-sector organisations to self-assess their commercial practices against the standard and benchmark their performance against their peers.

Since the current version of the GovS 008 and CCIAF launched in May 2022, a total of 149 contracting authorities across the public sector have enrolled, representing a combined third-party spend in excess of £162 billion.

The Government Commercial Function utilises the assessment detail to drive capability and maturity initiatives across government.