Commentary on provisions of the Act Section 1: Power to implement government procurement Chapters
Before an FTA can enter into force, the parties to the FTA should ensure that it is implemented domestically, to avoid breaching the FTA on entry into force. This means that each party to the FTA should ensure its domestic legislative framework is consistent with the obligations in the FTA. Not all obligations within an FTA require a change to the law.
	The UK-Australia FTA and UK-New Zealand FTA require changes to UK domestic procurement law. The scope of the power contained in the Act is to implement the government procurement Chapters of these Agreements, including the market access schedules (as they may be modified from time to time), and to make related provision.
	The UK previously implemented its procurement obligations under section 2(2) of the European Communities Act 1972 when the UK was still a Member State of the EU. Now that the UK has left the EU, the power in section 1 of the Act is needed to ensure that the obligations in the government procurement Chapters of the Agreements, and matters arising out of or related to those Chapters, can be implemented in domestic law.
	Section 1 provides a power for appropriate authorities to make regulations for two purposes:
Subsection 1(a) allows an appropriate authority to make regulations for the purpose of implementing the government procurement Chapters in the FTAs.
Subsection 1(b) allows an appropriate authority to make regulations for the purpose of making other changes for matters arising out of, or related to, the government procurement Chapters in the FTAs.
	The power in subsection 1(a) will be used to make the following changes:
to amend existing secondary legislation for procurement to extend the duties owed by contracting authorities, and remedies available in that legislation, to the suppliers of the relevant countries for procurement covered by the respective Agreements, implementing the market access conditions of the Agreements;
to amend existing secondary legislation for procurement to bring it in line with certain rules in the text of the government procurement Chapter of the UK-Australia FTA. The specific areas of the procurement regulations that may be amended relate to rules regarding (i) unknown contract values, (ii) notices advertising procurements, and (iii) termination of awarded contracts;
to amend existing secondary legislation to implement any changes to the government procurement Chapters of the Agreements over their lifetime, for example updates to the market access schedules to reflect certain machinery of government changes. The Procurement Bill is expected to include a power to implement the procurement market access obligations in future FTAs, including any updates to these Agreements. Accordingly, this power is intended to provide for future implementation only until it is replaced by the power in the Procurement Bill.
	The power in subsection 1(b) is to be read with sections 1(2) and 1(3).
	Section 1(2) allows the regulations under subsection 1(b) to be made also for cases falling outside the scope of the government procurement Chapters to provide for general application.
	Section 1(3) clarifies that a case is outside the scope of a government procurement Chapter if that Chapter does not impose an obligation on the UK in respect of that case, i.e. it is not an obligation owed specifically in the Chapter.
	The effect of subsection 1(b) read with 1(2) is that certain changes made to domestic law to implement the UK-Australia FTA, i.e. in respect of the rules in the text of the government procurement Chapter (see paragraph 17.b above), can apply generally and not only to suppliers from Australia. This will ensure procurement regulations remain uniform and coherent by not imposing different or conflicting procurement procedures on contracting authorities for procurements covered by the FTA, and ensure the UK can implement its obligations in the FTA in a way that is consistent with the UK’s other international procurement obligations.
	Section 1(4) defines "government procurement Chapters of the UK-Australia and UK-New Zealand FTAs" set out in section 1(4)(a) and (b) respectively, by reference to the relevant chapters and annexes in the FTAs.
	Section 1(5) defines the "UK-Australia FTA" and "UK-New Zealand FTA". These definitions include reference to the Agreement as it is modified from time to time in accordance with any provision of it. This clarifies that the scope of the power includes implementation of updates to the Agreements.