Scottish Refugee Council funding details: FOI Review

Information requested

Details of the use and planned expenditure for public contract worth £5,000,000 awarded to the Scottish Refugee Council, the contract will be for a period of 36 months with the option to extend for an additional 2 x 12-month periods.

Details of the accounting for the £5,000,000. https://bidstats.uk/tenders/2023/W16/797048878

Response

Following a review of your initial request, the information provided in that response and subsequent discussions with procurement colleagues on what supplier information can and cannot be released, I have concluded that the decision to release only the tender specification did not answer your FOI in full and ‘details of accounting’ were not provided in the original response. I am, therefore, able to provide further information to support your original request.

Attached is a copy of the pricing schedule submitted to procurement colleagues as part of The Scottish Refugee Council tender. You may also wish to note that the pricing schedule submitted is for the initial 3- year contract only. Consumer Price Inflation (CPI) has been applied to years 4 and 5, if the contract was to be extended.

An exemption under section 33(1)(b) of FOISA (commercial interests) applies to some of the information requested. This exemption applies because disclosure of this information would, or would be likely to, prejudice substantially the commercial interests of The Scottish Refugee Council. Disclosing the pricing breakdown would likely give competitors an advantage in future similar tendering exercises, which would limit The Scottish Refugee Council’s ability to submit future competitive tenders and, therefore, could significantly harm their commercial business.

This exemption is subject to the ‘public interest test’. Taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exemption. We recognise that there is a public interest in disclosing information as part of open and transparent government, and to help account for the expenditure of public money. However, there is a greater public interest in protecting the commercial interests of companies which tender for Scottish Government contracts to ensure that we are always able to obtain the best value for public money.

About FOI

The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at http://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.

FOI Review - 202300363724 - information released

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