Unlock the Power of eSignature Legitimateness for Procurement in European Union

How to eSign a document: eSignature legitimateness for Procurement in European Union

when dealing with the directives it's as I've mentioned important to realize that they are not codes as such they're not a comprehensive procurement code and neither the directives nor the UK regulations can really be seen as such and the reason for that is quite simple um we are not obviously the only member state in in in the European Union and many other m states have a long history of procurement law France for example they have Decades of procurement law wellestablished National legislation and what the directives were originally about was simply harmonizing where necessary the existing National measures to try and bring them together so that the differences between those measures did not create obstacles to trade between member states in in in in public sector purchasing um the deception as it were perhaps that's the wrong word the the problem from a from a UK perspective is that because we had a blank page um you start from a blank page and suddenly get produced these directives and regulations you suddenly think well that's the law that must be what I have to comply with and that is as I say is to miss the point these directives and were never intended to be a comprehensive code um you do have to sort of fill in the gaps and bear in mind that in fact they don't cover the whole territory the directives indeed exclude a number of different kinds of contract um altogether there are other kinds of contracts such as Part B service contracts which is a techn technical terminology for certain categories of service such as for for example um some education services a large R Legal Services a large range of services are Part B service contracts and they are subject to a reduced set of obligations under the directives um but even those contracts which are excluded from the directives it is now clear from the case law of the European court of justice are subject to the primary law that I referred to on the previous slide so you have the odd situation that if you read the directives you'd think for example that contracts construction contracts below the relevant uh thresholds of about um3 million you'd think that those contracts were not subject to any obligation um but you'd be wrong because the treaty we now know has some effect um Below on on contracts even below those thresholds although quite what the content of those obligations is is a matter of um debate in the case law um certainly doesn't make it any easier that it's these small contracts which are actually one of the current real Mine Fields in in EU procurement law so you have an aspect where at one level the um directives may be narrower um than than Primary Law um in the sense that the primary law covers a number of things which the directives don't there's also uh circumstances where the primary law may not apply at all you may be dealing with private utilities which might not normally be subject to the direct effect of some of the provisions um of Primary Law depending on on a number of technical questions um but the directives the utilities directive in particular means that procurement law does apply expressly to them so you have the a double confusion as I've put in the bubble at the bottom the directives may be both broader in some respects and narrower in other respects than the EU Primary Law so just simply trying to work out in any given case what is the relevant law to this particular type type of procurement is not straightforward