Orr to head Crossrail procurement panel

Outgoing ICE president David Orr is to provide expert procurement advice to London's £16bn Crossrail project, NCE has learnt.

Orr is to chair the Department for Transport's independent expert procurement panel, an oversight committee that will provide expertise and advice on procurement to the project.

Orr is currently corporate services director for the Northern Ireland Department of Finance and Personnel – a function he has performed while ICE president and one he intends to continue while chairing the procurement panel's quarterly meetings.

In his role for the Stormont administration, he is responsible for finance, personnel and business planning as well as a number of reform projects across the Northern Ireland Civil Service.

Orr said he sees his new role as: "providing an assurance that funding partners are putting in place the necessary measures to ensure that the programme is being taken forward in line with best practice".

Orr said the panel would work "very closely" with Crossrail client Cross London Rail Links (CLRL).

A CLRL spokesman said that Orr had been approached in his capacity as the former director of central procurement for the Northern Ireland Government rather than as a former ICE president.

"Crossrail is establishing a number of expert panels to oversee the construction of the project. The procurement panel will ensure that Crossrail's procurement policy will be open and transparent."

Orr said he was "very pleased" to be able to play a constructive role in such a massive project.

"The UK construction industry has already shown we can deliver big projects like the Channel Tunnel Rail Link and St Pancras, and I believe that good procurement central to that delivery."