26/10/18
Supreme Court to hear Minister’s appeal over
interpreter contract
The Supreme Court has
agreed to hear an appeal by the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform over
a decision overturning the award of a contract for supply of interpreters for
the State’s immigration service and Legal Aid Board.
The appeal will address
what criteria must be met before the courts can interfere with the award of a
contract following a tender process governed by public procurement regulations.
The Minister had applied
to the Supreme Court for leave to appeal a decision of the Court of Appeal last
June on proceedings brought by Word Perfect Translation Services Ltd, which
tendered unsuccessfully for the interpreters contract.
The contract was awarded
to another firm, Forbidden City Ltd, trading as Translation.ie. Word Perfect,
which supplied interpreters to State bodies over several years, lost out by
some 15 marks out of a possible 1,000 and it made several complaints about how
the tenders were evaluated.
The Court of Appeal
found two “manifest errors” in the tender evaluation process left it with no
option, particularly given the closeness of the contest, but to set aside the
award of the contract.
The request for tenders
for interpretation services was published in October 2015 by the Office of
Government Procurement.
The Court of Appeal
found that the evaluators committed one manifest error insofar as the quality
assurance plan was concerned in wrongly treating Translation.ie as having
supplied a “narrative” in the manner required by the tender when Translation.ie
had not done so.
