Rover Group, now owned by the consortium Phoenix, will be examining its purchasing strategy in the wake of the company’s break-up by former owner BMW, writes David Arminas.

A lack of adequate training is holding back the development of e-procurement, according to Theresa Rynard, senior category manager at building materials firm Caradon. Often, only key purchasing staff are trained in new technology, leaving occasional users to fumble in the dark, or revert to old methods and maverick buying, she said.

Few of Wales’s further education institutions have a procurement strategy or a purchasing officer, and the colleges are not doing enough to assess supplier performance, the National Audit Office has found.

In its report Further Education in Wales, the NAO comes down hard on the way institutions buy goods and services - in particular, energy and water.

A local government version of the Treasury’s long-awaited review of procurement reform in central government, headed by Marconi boss Peter Gershon, could be a natural progression from the work done by Geoffrey Filkin.