Additional changes to the Public Procurement Act will allow much of the so-called specialized enterprises to participate in public tenders. It’s about 129 companies for people with disabilities, of which, due to the difficulties in the current legislation, only 26 were interested in the procedures of state and municipal institutions.
The data that are available indicate very unfavourable trends in the participation in procurement of special firms that employ people with handicaps, said Deputy Prime Minister Daniela Bobeva. She pointed out that in 2008 25 orders for these companies were announced, while since the beginning of this year there have been only five. Even more unfavourable are the data on the total amount of the contracts – from 14 million levs it dropped to only 458 thousand levs over the last five years. We decided to find out what the problems behind these numbers are, and we want to promote the involvement in procurement of specialized enterprises. Through the planned changes hopefully many of these companies will have access to public money and start functioning in a better environment, said Deputy Premier on Economic Development.
The Secretary General of the Public Procurement Agency Ivo Katzarov also confirmed that there is little activity in the registration and showing interest on the part of such companies in public procurement. Of 26 companies respondents, 21 are members of an organization of people with disabilities and the general organizations that have shown interest are two. What is ridiculous is that some of the companies work under orders for millions of euros abroad, while in Bulgaria they have virtually no access to public tenders.
All these problems of specialized enterprises should be addressed through changes in the legislation. The new Art 16 of the Public Procurement Act radically changes the concept of public procurement, where the subject matter of the contract is production from the list of Art 30 of the Law on Integration of People with Disabilities – such as the production of clothing, shoes and other products. Future contracting will be obliged to announce similar tenders only for specialized enterprises or cooperatives of people with disabilities. Others will not be allowed to participate. Only if the procedure is unsuccessful, it will be announced anew as a general procedure.
Public procurement is the economic and nutritional environment in which we can develop specialized enterprises, not only in Bulgaria but also in the whole world. Returning to the fundamental ideas of social responsibility towards the people with disabilities is a good sign that in the face of government we can get practical realization of what is written in the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities in the EU directives, said the Chairman of the Agency for People with Disabilities, Mincho Koralski.
President of the Union of the Blind in Bulgaria Vasil Dolapchiev even expressed the hope that all these promises will actually translate into laws in Bulgaria, and after more than 10 years, this law will finally work for the employment of people with disabilities. According to him, the country has been between 200 000 and 220 000 people with varying types and degrees of permanent disability in the economically active age, while the unemployment rate in this social group is over 90 percent.
The BANKER
