Department of Education breached EU rules to hire schools repair

The Department of Education has admitted it was forced to breach EU procurement rules over appointing a contractor to carry out remediation works to 22 schools found to have structural flaws last year.

The department said it had engaged a contractor for the Schools Remediation Programme without publishing the tender in the Official Journal of the European Union as required by an EU directive, as there were a number of schools which required “urgent, permanent intervention works”. It said such an approach was necessary because of the “extreme urgency brought about by events unforeseeable for the contracting authority”.