PLA Working Groups

Members of the Procurement Lawyers’ Association share their expertise and views on public procurement law by way of Working Groups.

All members of the PLA are invited and welcome to join Working Groups.

Working Groups consider particular topics and in the past these have included Evaluation Shared Services and responses to formal consultations.

Please contact any member of the Executive Committee if you have any ideas for future Working Groups.

Duncan Osler (duncan.osler@macroberts.com) is the PLA’s current Working Group Facilitator and is happy to discuss any aspects of Working Groups with members at any time.

Operating Principles

The formation of Working Groups will be announced to the membership along with an invitation to attend an initial meeting.

At that meeting, the objectives of the Working Group should be set.

Any member may volunteer for the role of leader of a Working Group; the Facilitators will assist as necessary.

Thereafter, each Working Group should decide on its own approach and volunteer work programme, allocating responsibility to individuals to contribute individual pieces of work (such as case digests). Each Working Group should set, and keep under review, timescales for completing pieces of work, and through Facilitators.

Ideally and as far as possible, Working Groups should meet to discuss their work (rather than only conference calling). A Working Group should meet at least twice after the initial meeting, once to discuss core matters and later to reach a consensus on any difficult legal views or comment. That being a minimum, some Working Groups met on several occasions before completing their work.

Each Working Group should decide on the best means of circulating its output to members and beyond, such as by way of a PLA Event and release via the PLA website. Facilitators and the Events Coordinator will assist with the programming of Events.