Reusable Tender Clauses Address Council Collaboration in Procurement

Public-sector product and delivery manager Will Callaghan has published four reusable tender clauses intended to help councils raise collaboration, shared development and reuse during procurement. In an 11 September 2026 blog post, Callaghan credits Craig Barker of Cumberland Council with developing the wording. The clauses are presented as language that councils can adapt for their own procurements.

The four clauses ask suppliers to explain how their architecture, licensing and development practices support collaboration between councils; provide a forward-looking product roadmap; describe customer communities and formal routes for influencing development priorities; and show how their products can support government-backed collaborative projects, shared open standards and reusable sector platforms. Callaghan argues that putting these questions into procurement can help councils examine whether suppliers enable shared development and reuse rather than isolated work.

The blog post connects the approach with LocalGov Drupal. Callaghan says Cumberland Council has paid voluntary LocalGov Drupal subscriptions since the beginning and funded several modules, while LocalGov Drupal publishes a product roadmap and current development priorities. Barker's clauses were also inspired by LOTI procurement wording covering data access and API requirements, extending a similar procurement approach to collaboration and reuse.