ÚOHS prohibited MMR from concluding contracts for digitalization from the era of Minister Dostálová

Brno/Praha – The Office for the Protection of Competition (ÚOHS) has issued preliminary measures that prohibit the Ministry for Regional Development (MMR) from signing contracts related to the digitization of the building permit process. These are contracts that were to be concluded based on two competitive dialogues announced in October 2021, which the MMR is attempting to cancel repeatedly, said ÚOHS spokesman Martin Švanda to ČTK. This was also confirmed by Petr Waleczko from the MMR's press department. Waleczko told ČTK that the decision concerns outdated competitive dialogues that the ministry wishes to cancel.

According to Švanda, the office issued the preliminary measures at the request of the administrative courts. The administrative proceedings initiated last November, concerning the contract for the delivery of parts of the systems for digitizing the building permit process with InQool, has not yet been concluded with even a first-instance decision. The ministry is repeatedly trying to cancel contracts arising from the administration of former minister Klára Dostálová (ANO). Thus, the prohibition on signing contracts issued by the antimonopoly office is, according to Švanda, rather a formality.

"Administrative courts require the ÚOHS to ensure any administrative proceedings with a preliminary measure. The office thus issued prohibitions despite the fact that it is highly unlikely that the contracting authority wants to genuinely sign contracts in these competitive dialogues," Švanda stated. He added that the MMR had already canceled the competitive dialogues once, but the ÚOHS deemed that action illegal. The ministry is now attempting the same thing for the second time, and the ÚOHS has not yet decided in this case.

"The latest decision of the ÚOHS does not change the current plans of the MMR regarding the digitization of the building permit process. It concerns already outdated competitive dialogues that the ministry itself wants to cancel and does not intend to continue with," Waleczko told ČTK.

The ministry canceled the tender for the information system for digitizing the building permit process from 2021, with an estimated price of 1.9 billion crowns, and redistributed the mentioned billion among the regions. Subsequently, a new competition was initiated, and at the beginning of last June, a new supplier was chosen, who was supposed to carry out the digitization for approximately 1.2 billion crowns less than the offer from 2021. "However, the ministry ultimately did not conclude the contract due to objections from the company System Servis. They filed a complaint with the ÚOHS, which definitively canceled the procurement procedure of the MMR due to discriminatory conditions," stated Švanda.

The MMR subsequently assigned the creation of parts of the systems for digitizing the building permit process in a negotiation procedure without publication, that is, without a competition, to InQool. "The ministry chose the negotiation procedure without publication only for the key part of the entire architecture of the digitization of the building permit process, which the state is unable to deliver on its own. This is a contract worth about 37 million crowns including VAT, which is only about one-tenth of the total amount won for the digitization of the building permit process and hardware," stated Petr Waleczko from the MMR's press department to ČTK in November. Two proposals for a prohibition on fulfillment of this contract were submitted to the ÚOHS, including from VITA software, regarding which administrative proceedings are ongoing.

Last November, the MMR stated that blocking preparations should not delay the launch of the digitization of the building permit process scheduled for this coming July 1. Its operation has already been postponed twice; originally, the system was supposed to be functional last summer.