Council defend local spend

Recent figures published by the Scottish Local Government Benchmarking Framework show that East Dunbartonshire Council only spends nine per cent of its procurement budget with local small and medium sized enterprises - compared to a Scottish average of 20 per cent.

Depute Chief Executive, Education, People and Business, Ann Davie, said that the figure had increased in recent years and that the figures were skewed as often “local spend is with branches based within East Dunbartonshire but the locality of the main office is out with the geographical area...and therefore they are not recorded as being local SME spend.”

She added: “East Dunbartonshire Council is committed to supporting the local business community and we will continue to work together to ensure that our procurement processes encourage local spend whilst at the same time delivering value for money for residents.”