Analysis paper

The role of procurement in delivering mission-led government

How can the government remove the barriers to its missions?

23 SEP 2025

Ben Paxton Nick Davies

Keri Starmer delivering a speech in front of a robot — Keir Starmer wants public procurement to be used as a key strategic tool for delivering mission-led government.

This report looks at how public procurement could support delivery of mission-led government, and the key barriers to this. It explores how cultural, practical and organisational changes could enable government to harness the power of public procurement to deliver on its missions

This government intends to use public procurement as a key strategic tool for delivering mission-led government. Each year, it buys more than £400 billion of goods, works and services, giving procurement the power to shape markets, drive innovation and align public sector activity with its five missions.

However, there are several barriers to effectively using public procurement to support the government’s missions and new ‘mission-led’ ways of working, from insufficient clarity about the government’s missions and a lack of forward planning, to commercial professionals being brought into the policy process too late and low quality of procurement data.

Overcoming these barriers demands a different approach. Cultural, organisational and practical changes will be needed to harness the power of the market to develop innovative solutions to public sector challenges and deliver the outcomes that matter to citizens.

This report sets out recommendations for how the public sector should do things differently so that procurement can play a key role in enabling mission-led government.

A Briefing summarising the report's main findings can be found below (PDF).