Croydon LBC's decision to renew its total facilities management contract, hopefully saving millions of pounds, suggests a new era is under way in procurement processes, as Keith Dorling explains.

Last year, an MJ roundtable discussed how the economic challenge would change the way local authorities did things. As one individual at the event commented: ‘It's time to chew the elephant', while others said local authorities were going to need to radically rethink the way they procured services.