How we support local businesses

There are a number of ways we support local businesses. We have committed to making it easier for local companies and enterprises to do business with us by signing-up to the Voluntary Sector Compact (2005) and the Government’s SME Concordat (2006).

We are working with Sussex Enterprise and councils across Sussex to offer:

• a standard pre-qualification questionnaire for tenders not subject to European advertisement, to be used by all Sussex councils
• the same information on all council web sites about how to do business with each council
• all business opportunities will be advertised on all Sussex council websites and on the Supply2Gov website
• links between council websites and the Sussex Enterprise website to give you easy access to procurement information
• consideration of community benefit and corporate social responsibility as a tender evaluation criteria, and
• training events for you to find out more about this support.

Councils across Sussex are sharing business opportunities, especially in non-critical, hard to value areas of spending where local sourcing may be the best procurement option.