The government faces the challenge of making progress on its new procurement operational model while working with departments’ existing contracts, industry experts said.

At the end of 2010, John Collington of the Efficiency Reform Group (ERG), announced that his team aimed to transform the way government buys commonly used goods and services through category management, standard specification and aggregation of spend, to save 25% over 4years.

The 9 categories to begin this central procurement model are:

Energy, office supplies and professional services as the first three categories to be undertaken by March 2011.

Travel, fleet and telecoms will be addressed by June 2011

IT commodities, print management and advertising and media will be tackled by September 2011.

With March 2011 fast approaching, it is the wise supplier who keeps abreast of developments in this area

A spokesman for Price Waterhouse Coopers said, “Some contracts could be terminated, others will have to run their course,” he said. “The costs of ending contracts could be more inefficient than keeping them alive. There could be many different deals kept running when less have been identified as needed. It will take longer than nine months to get all nine areas tackled.”

The Cabinet Office declined to comment on how it would end multiple contracts with existing suppliers in individual Whitehall departments in order to enable the introduction of a centralised model.