Norway
Norway has both a Public Procurement Act and a Regulation on Public Procurement № 974 that include the following RBC objectives:
Other policy frameworks
Regarding environmental issues, more specifically on green energy and procurement of vehicles, the Norwegian government adopted the Regulation № 1 995 on Energy and Environmental Requirements when Purchasing Vehicles for Road Transportation (Green Vehicles) in December 2017.
Regarding labour rights, the Norwegian regulations on wages and working conditions in public contracts № 112 were adopted in February 2008, setting specific rules throughout its sections.
Strategic frameworks
Even though the 2015 National strategy for combating work-related crime is not a specific strategy for Public Procurement and labour rights, it does address public procurement.
In 2019, the Norwegian Government presented a white-paper on public procurement, which considers how to work with environmental issues, human and labour rights and integrity considerations in public procurement procedures.
The Norwegian Government is working on an action plan to increase green public procurement and innovation.
The Norwegian Digitalisation Agency (DigDir) is the national CPB, which has a strategic public procurement framework that in some aspects goes beyond the national one. This strategy states that human and labour rights clauses are mandatory in all of their procurement procedures.
The Public Procurement Act and the Regulation on Public Procurement № 974 covers the following procurement phases:
Tender phase
During the tender phase, contracting authorities must pay special attention to minimise the environmental impact of the purchase and to promote climate-friendly solutions. To this end, they shall set environmental requirements and award criteria in all stages of the procurement.
When purchasing vehicles, the contracting authorities, operators and subcontractors are obliged to take into account, at the very least, some environmental requirements and the energy and environmental effects.
It is mandatory for the contracting authorities to ensure short supply chains in contracts for construction and cleaning services.
Post-tender phase
It is mandatory for contracting authorities to ensure that contracts clearly stipulate that employees of suppliers or any subcontractors must have wages and working conditions that are in accordance with the Norwegian Regulation № 112.
The Norwegian Agency for Public and Financial Management (Direktoratet for forvaltning og økonomistyring, DFØ) uses special contract clauses for safeguarding human and labour rights in the supply chain.
The Norwegian Ministry on Trade, Industry and Fisheries and DFØ have developed extensive guidelines for stakeholders to better understand and comply with the sustainable policy objectives.
In 2020, the Office of the Auditor General conducted a special project to monitor how contracting authorities implement environmental considerations in their procurement practices.
DFØ has developed a risk analysis procedure for all of their public procurement and contract management processes. This risk analysis procedure identifies high-risk sectors in regards to human rights like construction, transport or furniture, among others.