Departments: Ministerial Red Boxes
Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs
John Hemming (Birmingham, Yardley, Liberal Democrat)
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how many Ministerial red boxes his Department bought in each of the last five years; what the cost of each was; who the suppliers were: and what tendering process was used in selecting them.
Jim Murphy (Minister of State (Europe), Foreign & Commonwealth Office; East Renfrewshire, Labour)
The information requested by the hon. Member is only available for years 2004, 2005, 2006 and 2007.
| Number of boxes | Total value (£) | |
| 2004 | 0 | 0 |
| 2005 | (1)8 | 3,600 |
| 2006 | (2)6 | 2,900 |
| 2007 | 1 | 490 |
| (1 )Two separate orders (2) Three separate orders | ||
The requirements for these boxes are infrequent and are satisfied through single source procurement strategy with Barrow and Gale. There is no current long-term contract in place. During 2004 the opportunity was taken to market test the prices and those provided by Barrow and Gale were found to provide the best value on price and quality.