The Labour group on Tendring District Council is pushing for local businesses to be given priority whenever possible when it comes to TDC’s procurement policy.
In a debate on the need to purchase steel for cliff stabilisation work within the district, the leader of the Labour Group, Cllr. Ivan Henderson, put forward Labour’s position that the council should be looking to use local businesses whenever possible and businesses based within this country where appropriate. Labour’s position received the backing of the Conservative leader of the council, Cllr. Neil Stock, who stated, “I think Cllr. Henderson is on to something here. We should do everything we can to support local businesses as much as possible but we need to have a coherent strategy in place.”
Cllr. Stock went on to say, “I completely agree with what Cllr. Henderson is saying. If we can support British jobs then we are going to want to do that. If we can support even more localised jobs by employing local contractors we should be doing that every time.”
In his speech during the debate Ivan had told the meeting, “When we give out these contracts in the future, I would like the council to start looking at putting conditions on to make sure we either support local business or national business within this country.”
The Labour group is extremely pleased that the Conservative led administration supports Labour’s position and is agreeing to develop the council’s policy accordingly. This procurement policy has existed on Labour led Harwich Town Council for many years and Labour is delighted to have been able to support local businesses by persuading Conservative led TDC to follow this example.
