Showing posts with label Enterprise. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Enterprise. Show all posts

Sunday 6 October 2013

Will Veolia, as sole bidder, represent Best Value for Brent Public Realm contract?

The Officers' report on the Public Realm contract to be presented to the Brent Council Executive on Monday October 14th reveals that only Veolia submitted a final bid. Serco dropped out at Stage 3 due to internal changes within the company structure and 'issues relating to resourcing and targets' but more controversially at the final stage Enterprise, the only competitor to Veolia left, asked for extra time to finalise their bid. The report states:
Officers fully considered the merits of the request but determined that it was not appropriate to agree such an extension.
The report contains no explanation or justification for this decision in the same way as campaigners were given no explanation for the panel's decision that no grounds existed for the exclusion of Veolia on human rights grounds.

A spokesman for Amey, who now own Enterprise said unfortunately as there is an on-going procuremnt process, we cannot comment further at this time.
 
The officers' decision means that the comparative tables for the Invitation to Submit Final Tenders (ISFT) stage look rather ludicrous:

In an email to Brent Executive members I wrote:
It is clearly legitimate to ask if ‘Best Value’ has been obtained when such a large contract is awarded with no competitive bid to evaluate it against. It is also legitimate to ask why Enterprise was not granted more time to submit. (Enterprise has now been taken over by Amey)
The new contract is a mixed bag with some improvements envisaged for the service but other changes which impact on jobs.

The Council expects costs for the new contract to be £1.3m less in the first year 2014-15 rising to £1.7m in 2017-18. This is brought about by reduction in the crews of bin lorries and the expectation that all residents, except those not physically able to, will leave their bins at their property boundary. These changes will be implemented before the new contract with a reduction in costs this financial year of £300,000.

88 council workers are directly affected  and will be subject to TUPE, although Veolia has said it will honour their pension position. Wetton's employees who service Brent Housing Partnership estates  and SDK employees who empty the dog excrement bins will also be subject to TUPE,

More positively, Veolia has undertaken to pay those who remain the London Living Wage, although that will be little comfort to those who lose their jobs. Volia has also undrtaken to fulfill the 'Safer Lorries' pledge which protects cyclists, to offer 8 apprenticeships and to take action to offer jobs locally through various agencies.

One aspect that may concern councillors is that Veolia will be responsible for monitoring itself:
The contract will be self-monitoring, meaning that the contractor is accountable for measuring, monitoring and improving their own performance with the council carefully auditing their performance. This, along with Key Outcome Targets set for each of the different services will ensure that the Contractor is motivated to deliver the services.
Veolia will also be dealing with complaints from councillors and residents in the first instance thus 'placing responsibility on the Contractor to ‘own’ and be accountable for service complaints'.

All new or replacement residual bins will be 140litre rather than the present 240litre. Large households or multi-occupied premises will be able to request a largr bin if they can justify it. Although increased recycling should mean a smaller residual bin is adequate I do worry that some of the fly-tipping so evident on our streets is the result of residual bins being full and residents then dumping the excess on the street.

There are changes to the street sweeping regime with the expectation that streets will meet the Grade A standard after cleansing and will not fall below Grade B:

Grade A: No litter or refuse
Grade B: Predominately free of litter and refuse apart from some small items
Grade C: Widespread distribution of litter and/or refuse with minor accumulations
Grade D: Heavily affected by litter and/or refuse with significant accumulations

This is clearly a challenge given the current state of our streets.

One of the main concerns of residents has been over parks maintenance. We are rightly proud of our parks and have witnessed the sensitivity of Brent staff in maintaining them properly, rather than the 'chainsaw' gardening that we see on some estates where shrubs are reduced to three dimensional geometric shapes regardless of whether they are about to come into flower or have a different natural shape.

Although the report says that Veolia has agreed to maintain the parks to Green Flag standard, without any further explanation it also says that the council will no longer submit  applications for Green Flag Awards. Given how the council has always proudly publicised these awards, and the tremendous effort parks staff put into achieving them, I can only ask why not submit applications? Surely the Award is a prestigious external audit of the success or otherwise of the contract?

The full report can be found HERE







Tuesday 20 August 2013

Hundreds urge Brent to exclude Veolia from Public Realm contract



Around 40 human rights demonstrators gathered outside Brent Civic Centre last night as a petition signed by hundred of Brent residents was presented to the Brent Executive calling for Veolia to be excluded from the Public Realm contract procurement process. The contract worth up to £250m over 16 years will be awarded by the Brent Executive at their October 14th meeting.

Exclusion is sought on the grounds that Veolia in its operations in the occupied territories of Palestine is colluding in the maintenance of illegal settlements and this infringing the human rights of Palestinians.

Veolia has been short-listed alongside Enterprise and Serco for the contract.

After hearing the speech from Liz Lindsay, Secretary of Brent and Harrow Palestine Solidarity and an activist in the Bin Veolia in Brent Campaign, the Executive referred the petition to FionaLedden, head of procurement for consideration.

Liz Lindsay's speech was warmly applauded from the crowded public gallery.

THE CASE AGAINST VEOLIA'S INCLUSION IN THE 
BRENT PUBLIC REALM PROCUREMENT


Just as pension funds are concerned about ethical investment we believe the council should be concerned about ethical procurement. 

The public would not want the council   to give contracts to companies involved in the exploitation of child labour or the arms trade.

Veolia who are bidding for the Public Realm contract are serving the illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

The UK Govt and UN do not recognise Israel’s annexation of the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem.
Veolia helps support Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestinian land by
  • Supporting the Jerusalem Light Rail between West Jerusalem and an illegal settlement
  • Running bus routes along the Apartheid road 443 that link illegal Israeli  settlements .
  • Owning  the Tovlan landfill site that takes refuse from illegal settlements and Israel.

Veoila therefore profits by actively supporting Israel’s continued violation of international humanitarian law
 
Under Public Contracts Regulations, a public body may exclude a bidder or reject a bid where it is found the organisation has ‘committed grave misconduct in the course of their business’
In 2009, the UN General Assembly called on Israel to cease the dumping of waste  in occupied Palestinian land.

In 2010, UK was one of countries that voted in support of the UNHR Council resolution that stated JLR operated by Veolia is in clear violation of International Law and relevant UN resolutions.
In 2012, Richard Falk UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in the OPT concludes that
Veolia’s grave breaches of the UN Global Compact make it an inappropriate partner for any public institution, especially as a provider of public services.

Also, Veolia was forced to withdraw JLR recruitment advertisements because they discriminated against Palestinians.

Locally,  WLWA, Ealing, Harrow, Richmond did not select Veolia as the preferred bidder and all had been involved in discussions with anti-Veolia campaigners.

Veolia withdrew after 2 years from the final stages of the £4.5bn NLWA procurement when they were one of only two bidders left.

As Veolia has become the target of worldwide campaigns, Veolia  has tried to waive responsibility, claiming in 2011 for example that it had sold Tovlan. 

However,  on the 17th Jan 2013, the Israeli Ministry of Environmental Protection –in response to FOI by a Women's Peace Group in Tel Aviv confirmed that Veolia is the sole owner and operator of Tovlan.
We informed Brent Council of this on the 14th March but Veolia repeated its claim on 21st May 2013.
The Council does not appear to have challenged this misrepresentation. 

In June 2013, an Israeli Court fined Veolia 1.5 million shekels for burying mixed waste to avoid higher fees and for keeping inconsistent records.

Brent Council should seriously question any information that Veolia provides in its defence in its bid to win the contract.

One argument used against exclusion has been that Veolia in Israel and in the UK are separate entities. There is ample evidence available that Veolia is one commercial entity. 

Also, Justin Brazier, Tory MP, facilitated a meeting between Veolia Executive, Robert Hunt and Canterbury Campaigners at which Robert Hunt confirmed that Veolia was one commercial entity. 

Francis Maude on the 23rd May, 2012 stated explicitly,  regarding illegal settlements that companies that have committed ‘an act of grave professional misconduct in the course of their business may be excluded from a tender exercise’

WHY IS IT IMPORTANT FOR BRENT COUNCIL?

Brent Council is particularly proud of representing a diverse population and is committed to equality and opposed to racism as demonstrated recently by their stand against the 'racist van' and the UKBA raids. 
Human rights issues are at the core of the Council's values.

Our campaign has been supported by members from many religions and non-religious residents, by members of the Labour, Lib Dem and Green parties, by Brent TUC, trade unions,  GCs of Brent Central,  and Hampstead and Kilburn Labour Parties and local members of Jews for Justice for Palestinians.

We call on the Executive to take a principled stand on the issue of Veolia's collusion in the abuse of the human rights of Palestinians in the occupied territories and to take action by excluding Veolia from the £260m Public Realm contract.

Bishop Tutu said what he saw in occupied Palestine could describe apartheid South Africa.. Nelson Mandela, now a Freeman of Brent, said he would not be truly free until the Palestinian people are free. Respect them -  BIN VEOLIA!.