Procurement in a Nutshell: Anti-Corruption Strategy 2025
2nd January, 2026
Procurement in a Nutshell
2nd January 2026
Procurement in a Nutshell: Anti-Corruption Strategy 2025
Find out more
As part of the government's UK Anti-Corruption Strategy 2025, emphasis will be placed on local government, corrupt insiders, procurement and capability and knowledge as part of the effort to deter corruption effectively within public sector bodies.
Why is this strategy important?
In its section on “Tackling UK Vulnerabilities”, the strategy report notes that the government considers the public sector one of the most vulnerable to exploitation by corrupt actors, given its substantial scale and reach in the UK.
Decisions about how public money is spent or how services are delivered are also at risk from corrupt individuals. For example, if a public official is seen to act corruptly, this could lead to a loss of public trust in local and national institutions. The government has formulated this strategy to address corruption in the public sector directly.
How does this impact procurement?
The strategy depicts that measures in the Procurement Act 2023 will raise procurement standards by taking tougher action on fraud and corruption.
The government have also initially agreed the following commitments to:
- Monitor participation rates of procurement training and evaluate the effectiveness of learning and development products.
- Ensure compliance of the transparency regime under the Procurement Act 2023 and monitor data quality.
- Improve access to, and use of, procurement data for public reporting, and work with government stakeholders to shape transparency analytics.
- Plan to review and evaluate the effectiveness of the debarment regime, which allows ministers to list suppliers whose past conduct or circumstances disqualify them from public procurement.
- Monitor the contracting authority landscape through referrals and internal reports to the Procurement Review Unit, allowing for oversight and, where appropriate, recommending actions to improve compliance, including anti-corruption measures, with the Procurement Act.
- Analyse the available commercial data held on the central digital platform to generate insights and intelligence on market performance, enabling assessment of potential corruption risks.
For further information please contact Melanie Pears or Tim Care in our Public Sector Team.
Please note that this briefing is designed to be informative, not advisory and represents our understanding of English law and practice as at the date indicated. We would always recommend that you should seek specific guidance on any particular legal issue.
This page may contain links that direct you to third party websites. We have no control over and are not responsible for the content, use by you or availability of those third party websites, for any products or services you buy through those sites or for the treatment of any personal information you provide to the third party.
