The head of our Public Procurement team Kadri Härginen successfully defended her PhD dissertation, “Due diligence obligations of a contracting authority under the EU public procurement law “.
Errors in complying with public procurement, including legal practice examples of termination of employment and criminal punishments for breaches of public procurement law, lie in the heart of the thesis – what is a diligent contracting authority? EU public procurement rules have been in place since 1971, so it could be assumed that this is no longer an innovative issue but a long-overdue one. However, this is not the case.
To find out a comprehensive approach to the contracting authority’s due diligence, in the course of her doctoral thesis, Kadri analysed the judgments of the European Court of Justice dealing directly or indirectly with requirements for the diligence of the contracting authority. From the basis of this, Kadri found that the contracting authority’s due diligence in EU public procurement law is sector-specific organisational due diligence. It aims to ensure the functioning of the EU internal market through the implementation of the EU’s public procurement principles. Thus, due diligence under EU law extends to contracting authorities as organisations, not to individuals, and is not a general obligation of human due diligence but an obligation that is activated in the context of EU public procurement law.
Supervisors:
Associate professor, PhD Carri Ginter (University of Tartu, Faculty of Law)
Associate professor, Dr. iur. Mari Ann Simovart (University of Tartu, Faculty of Law)
Read Kadri Härginen’s PhD dissertation here
