I don’t know the details, but the scenario painted here is all too familiar.
If the radio is really £50, or even £500, (it’s nearer the former, I know the kit) you do this;
Ask Unit to provide a shopping list. How many. Training. Manuals. Trials. Call it consumable, no repair contract required.
Get quote from supplier. Invite him to supply trials kit and support for trials. They won’t charge, but subsume it in the main quote.
Write a short Business Case / Submission. (Less than £5M, one side A4 max). Put, in ******* great bold type at the top, “Duty of Care / Critical Health and Safety Constraint”.
Sign the Technical and Financial Approval. (Even the lowest technical grade in DE&S should be able to approve 2 or 3 million).
Hand to Financier for Financial Endorsement (they don’t approve, they just state where the money’s coming from). Don’t leave his desk until it’s signed. There isn’t an IPT in MoD that can’t find such a small sum in underspend or offest. Many IPTs will spend £1500 a day on consultants. That’s 30 radios.
Walk across to Commercial, and ask them to e-mail authority to the Unit to purchase what they want on Local Purchase Order, or, trot off a small value order contract.
One of my old IPTs used to do this for fun every day. It’s not breaking any rules, it’s meeting a Duty of Care obligation. If, as it seems in this case, people get “pedantic” (i.e. so far up themselves) there is a slightly more devious, but quicker, route. Of course I don’t condone being devious……….
I’m puzzled though. Given the radio, or something very similar, is used in-service, why on earth does the Requirement Manager not simply get it scaled to the school? They place a demand and the system takes over….. The company who supplies the antenna used to supply them free!!!
Something not right here.