The Swedish Experience Public Procurement and Accessibility a stakeholder approach

Transcription

1 The Swedish Experience Public Procurement and Accessibility a stakeholder approach Mia Ahlgren mia.ahlgren@hso.se SWEDISH DISABILITY FEDERATION

2 Public Procurement Directive Article 42 For all procurement which is intended for use by natural persons, whether general public or staff of the contracting authority, the technical specifications shall, except in duly justified cases, be drawn up so as to take into account accessibility criteria for persons with disabilities or design for all users. Where mandatory accessibility requirements are adopted by a legal act of the Union, technical specifications shall, as far as accessibility criteria for persons with disabilities or design for all users are concerned, be defined by reference thereto. Source: Public Procurement Directive 2014 Implementation in Swedish law 1st of January 2017 The National Agency for public procurement

3 Sweden 10 million inhabitants The goal of ICT policy is for Sweden to be the best in the world at utilising the opportunities of digitalisation. Public Procurement general data: Total purchases subject to procurement regulations approximately a fifth of GDP (2012) 36 per cent governed by the EU s public procurement directives. (2014) 47 % of the directive governed procurements framework agreements Sources: Swedish Government Swedish Competition Authority

4 Usability in framework agreements EU-project ACCENT 1998: Define accessibility in the context of user friendliness and ease- ofuse, as this has more obvious relevance to many organisations. Stakeholders: Academia KTH, SME:s in usability consultancy Public Agency: Swedish Agency for Administrative development Standards development related to Human centred design in ICT for example ISO 9241 and ISO Definition of accessibility close to usability ICT procurement public sector, examples mobile telephones, printers, authoring tools Guidelines Call off Usability 2005 Updated 2013, Guides for Usability competence

5 Forum for Usability in ICT Government decided to create the forum with main task to have a continuous dialogue concerning accessibility and usability as a quality indicator of ICT. Stakeholders: 24 experts from civil society, the private and public sector as well as scientists and researchers. Among best practises, seminars and reports: Procurement of usable ICT systems related to role of the procurer The whole journey project focusing on the user perspective and design ideas based on reseach about method workshop for realitybased prototyping.

6 Stakeholders in standardisation Swedish Standards Consumers & Workers Council is working to promote end-user representation in standardization and the application of relevant standards. Stakeholders: Non-profit organisations representing, consumers, trade unions, environment and persons with disabilities The Swedish model of financing fees and travel instead of free participation of the enduser experts in standards aims at achieving equal treatment and the same financial contribution to the technical committees. Source Swedish Standards Consumers and workers council

7 Accessibility standards European mandates for procurement 376 e- Accessibility, 420 Built environment as well as 473 Design for all and other standardization Stakeholders: Disability and Consumer NGO:s Swedish Agency for Participation. Swedish Post and Telecom Agency, National service for procurement, Accessibility consultants NGO:s active also in standards related to ISO, ITU in areas of media accessibility, ICT, cognitive accessibility, packages, sustainable procurement, emerging remote participation European standard under development (M473) on how to consider accessibility following the Design for All approach in organisations

8 Monitoring municipalities Municipalities Administrative ICT system for time reporting More than 60 per cent do not know Intranet Almost 60 per cent do not know Accessibility requirement for built environment to facilities 32 per cent in 2015 and 20 percent in 2016 do not know 7 % 4 % 21 % 21 % 33 % 45 % Procurement related schools, learning material, About 30 per cent do not know But independent schools are not covered. The share of indpendent schools can be between 0 97 per cent in municipalities. 63 % 65 % Source: Public Agency for Participation (based on data from survey to municipalities) Public enquiry SOU 2016:78

9 Monitoring Public agencies The ordinance 2001:526 for public agencies requires them to work to ensure that people with disability are afforded full participation in the life of the community and equality of conditions of life. The authorities shall in particular work to ensure that their premises, operations and information are accessible for people with disability. The United Nation Convention on the rights of people with disabilities, shall constitute guidance for this work. Yearly follow up asking Public Agencies if they include accessibility requirements in procurement, about percent answering: % 43 % 45 % 46 % 46 % 47 % Source: Public Agency for Participation

10 Green public procurement 1995, the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency estimated a majority of public procurements included environmental requirements. However, few requirements led to actual improvements of the environmental performance. Stakeholders: Experts from professional organizations, industry associations, state, county and municipality level governments Criteria developed linked to ECO-labeling, with continual monitoring and revision adjusted to changes in legislation or technology standards. Voluntary should requirement political support. Tools for linking to environmental goals Criteria wizard the National Agency for Public Procurement Number of Public contracts including GPP criteria 2013 County councils :100 % Local Authorities 84 % Governmental agencies 44 Total percentage increase: % % Source: Swedish Competition Authority Source: OECD report

11 Sustainable procurement Every organization has environmental, social and economic impacts. Procurement as a tool for implementing Sustainable development goals. Swedish Standard: Universal Design as one possible driver for sustainable procurement. Alternative texts for figures in the document. Stakeholders: Experts from the whole world on procurement in Public sector, Industry, NGO and close liaison with UN, input from OECD, ITUC, EU Standards development related to ISO Social responsability ISO Sustainable Procurement expected to be available in March or April Sustainable procurement Indicator under development

12 Next steps Systematic inclusion of accessibility requirements in all public procurement agreements (UN recommendation, april 2014) there are opportunities to make increased demands for accessibility in procurement. This would lead to more products, premises, goods and services being made accessible from the start. It would also reduce the need to rectify accessibility flaws at a later stage, which leads to reduced costs (Swedish government 2016) Revised national disability strategy (expected 2017) Accessibility criteria in national database (expected 2017) Sources: Concluding observations from UN CRPD Committee April 2014 Report to the government from the Public Agency for Participation 2016 Response from Swedish Government May 2016 to UN special rapporteur survey

13 Public procurement process The public procurement process starts with the identification of a need and an analysis of how this need can be satisfied. Source: Swedish Competitions Authority