Commercial and Procurement services supplier newsletters

April 2025 newsletter

Welcome to the spring edition of our quarterly Supplier Newsletter.

We begin this issue by highlighting the City of Edinburgh Council’s new Sustainable Procurement Strategy 2025-2030 which comes into effect from the 1st April 2025 and invite you to familiarise yourself with key priorities and strategic procurement objectives influencing how we intend to purchase responsibly and sustainably.

We take the opportunity to promote good news stories in relation to the delivery of community benefits over the past 12 months and the positive impact they’ve achieved for our communities.  We encourage you to share with us your good news stories and photographs of benefits delivered which will be reported publicly as part of our annual report.

We also share useful tender training opportunities, sustainability resources and upcoming events available to support you with the tendering process, climate change information and new growth opportunities.

As always, we’ve included a list of upcoming tender opportunities and encourage you to register for alerts on the Public Contract Scotland website.

If you would like to receive our quarterly supplier newsletter direct to your inbox, please email us at supplierdevelopment@edinburgh.gov.uk.

We look forward to working with you.

Lynette Robertson

Head of Commercial and Procurement Services

Sustainable Procurement Strategy 2025-2030

From 1st April 2025, the Council’s new Sustainable Procurement Strategy 2025-2030 comes into effect, setting out a clear framework for how the Council intends to buy goods, works and services responsibly and sustainably.

Approved by the Finance and Resources Committee on 13 March, after extensive internal and external consultation, the strategy strengthens our commitment to social, economic and environmental sustainability. Key priorities include:

  • delivering contracts that help meet the Council’s commitment to the climate and nature emergencies and deliver a just transition
  • maximising a community wealth building approach by ensuring contracts support local jobs, local economies, fair work and deliver community benefits  
  • enhancing supplier diversity by increasing opportunities for SMEs, social enterprises and third sector organisations 
  • ethical Sourcing to ensure fairness, transparency and human rights considerations in our supply chains
  • the delivery of savings and best value through innovative and sustainable solutions

An Action Plan will support the implementation of the strategy focusing on staff training, supplier engagement and improved monitoring to track progress against sustainability goals.

For further details visit Sustainable Procurement Strategy.

Community Benefits Reporting

We would like to advise our current suppliers that as part of our Annual Reporting to the Scottish Government, the Council will be reporting on the volume and type of community benefits delivered in Financial Year 24/25. This is an opportunity for both the Council and our suppliers, to showcase good news stories and photographs of some of the excellent community related initiatives delivered as part of our contracts in the last 12 months. Thus if you have any community benefit related photos or good news stories to share, please forward these to supplierdevelopment@edinburgh.gov.uk. Please remember to provide reference to the Council contract and the Council contract manager as part of your submission.

Climate Ready Edinburgh

Climate Ready Edinburgh Plan was approved in August 2024 and is our new climate change adaptation plan for the city. Read the Climate Ready Edinburgh Plan to learn about the actions that the city must take to prepare for the shocks and stresses associated with climate change impacts (such as extreme flooding events, heat waves and other weather events).

To prepare your business for extreme weather and increase business resilience the new SME Resilience Checklist from the Adaptation Scotland is available for reference. The checklist is accompanied by case studies of businesses in Scotland taking action to prepare for how climate change may affect their business, improving their business’ resilience to shocks, and identifying new growth opportunities.

Meet The Council Event

Commercial and Procurement Services supported the Business Growth and Inclusion team with the City of Edinburgh Council’s first ever Meet the Council event for local businesses. Hosted at the Assembly Rooms in George Street, over 30 business-facing council teams and selected external partners were on hand to answer questions and provide advice for the 100 businesses who attended on the day.

It was great to meet with local businesses, many of them new, and be able to share how best to find opportunities to work with the Council. As part of this we were able to point them in the direction of the free Supplier Development Programme which provides support for tendering and other resources.

Meet the Buyer National 2025 – 4 June 2025

Scotland’s National Meet the Buyer event will take place at Murrayfield Stadium in Edinburgh on Wednesday 4 June 2025. This free event is hosted by the Supplier Development Programme and partnered by Scottish Government and Scotland Excel.

Come along to this free to visit event to introduce your company and meet procurement teams, buyers and supply chain partners. Meet the Buyer is the place to discuss projects and tender opportunities, on a local and national scale, across Scotland and the UK. The City of Edinburgh Council’s Procurement team will be there on hand to answer any queries you may have. All suppliers are eligible to attend for free. However, you must register an account with SDP to book a place.

Upcoming Tender Training Opportunities For Suppliers

The Supplier Development Programme offers an extensive list of training and events to help small to medium sized businesses, as well as supported businesses, become “tender ready”. Check out the Events Calendar to see what’s happening, and register to book your place, including:

1.1 Working with the Public Sector - All You Need to Know – Thursday 17 April 2025, Webinar.  New to bidding, tendering and procurement? Join this introductory course to gain a comprehensive overview of the public sector marketplace in Scotland and beyond.

1.2 Using Public Contracts Scotland (PCS) – How to Find and Bid for Opportunities – Thursday 24 April 2025, Webinar.  Join this webinar to learn everything you need to know about Public Contracts Scotland, the national public sector tender portal for Scotland.

1.3 Getting Your Business Tender Ready - The Checklist – Tuesday 29 April 2025, Webinar.  Knowing what your business needs to have in place before you start tendering is the foundation to success. This webinar will provide you with an easy to use checklist and description of all the policies, processes and evidence you need to have ready before you bid on an opportunity.

1.4 Planning Your Bid – Time and Resources – Thursday 8 May 2025, Webinar.  The biggest learning curve in tendering is understanding the time, energy and resources that go into creating a winning bid. This webinar will walk you through the steps of how to plan and manage your bid, making it as stress free as possible.

Supplier drop-in sessions

Commercial and Procurement Services team runs monthly virtual 1-2-1 engagement sessions. These are an excellent opportunity to ask any burning questions you may have if you’re interested in working in, or becoming part of, the supply chain that delivers goods, services or works to the Council. If you’d like to drop-in, please email procurement.delivery@edinburgh.gov.uk.

Tender opportunities

You can find details of contract opportunities with the Council on the Public Contract Scotland website. You will also find future opportunities for noting interest and engaging in the development where appropriate, we expect these will include the following.

Current opportunities

Prior Information Notices

Future opportunities

  • Contractor Works Framework, estimated publishing date April 2025
  • Housing Capital Works Framework – Kitchen & Bathrooms, estimated publishing date April 2025
  • Housing Capital Works Framework – Multi-trade, estimated publishing date April 2025
  • Contractor Works – Accessibility Works, Ramps and Platform Lifts, estimated publishing date April 2025
  • Letter Distribution and Installation, estimated publishing date May 2025
  • Professional Qualification Framework Agreement – Further Education – Apprentice/Trainee, estimated publishing date May 2025

Useful resources