Taxpayers will be saving almost €4 million as a tender awarded for the building of a new health centre in Paola has been reversed following serious doubts on how the original evaluation and adjudication process was carried out.
Some days ago, the Department of Contracts said it had decided to reverse its original decision and to award the project to Egron-Technoline Consortium at the price of €22 million.
This reverses the original decision made by the Contracts Department earlier this year to award the same contract to SP BB International JV, despite their quote a cost of €26 million.
Read: ‘War’ over multimillion-euro Paola health centre tender
The Department of Contracts had tried to justify its decision by saying the consortium with the lowest price was not compliant with the tender requirements and was eliminated.
However, following an appeal, both the Public Contracts Review Board (PCRB) and the Appeals Court raised doubts on the way the evaluation was carried by government officials and ordered a re-evaluation of the tender through a completely new evaluation committee.
In its decision, the Appeals Court had described as “of serious concern” the way the multi-million tender was evaluated which raised “serious doubts on the process”.
The court also objected to submissions made by the original awardee, a consortium made up of Bonnici Brothers, Ray Vella and Pantalesco, that the PCRB had no remit to state that a bank guarantee, requested in the tender, was not in line with public procurement rules.
Chief Justice Joseph Azzopardi said that since the tender involved millions of euros in public funds and the appeals board had noticed an irregularity, “it was not only its remit but also its duty to make sure that things are done correctly".
It was not only its remit but also its duty to make sure that things are done correctly
“The court is also concerned with the fact that the evaluation board did not even notice the irregularity of the banking guarantee and this raises doubts as to whether there are other factors the evaluating board did not notice.”
The PCRB also criticised harshly the way the government was appointing members of evaluation committees as the people appointed did not have the necessary knowhow on the way such processes should be conducted.
Health Ministry sources said that although it took long, the decision means that taxpayers had saved €4 million in the cost of the project.
“At the same time, this also shows how certain decisions are being taken by the government despite the fact that such a big difference in the price of a public project was clear from the start,” the sources said.
“It was only thanks to the appeals, and not to the government, that €4 million was not wasted.”