TOR164 - The Power and Promise of Open Contracting with Gavin Hayman

Terms Of Reference Podcast

How much money did your government spend in 2016? The Government of the United States spent over $3.5 trillion dollars. China threw down $2.8 trillion and the UK just over $1 trillion. Worldwide, governments spent a combined total of $22.7 trillion. My point here is that there is a ton of money being spent by governments around the globe to procure products and services.

It would be great to know where exactly all of that money goes, right? I mean, in most of the major economies out there, there is an expectation that the public should know what their hard earned taxes are funding. And, there are some big figures out there, usually represented in pie charts, that are relatively easy to access.

But what about specifics? Governments spend a great deal of money internally, for things like defense, but - especially in a place like the United States - governments rely on contractors for products and services. Everything from vaccines to uniforms. In order to find out what any individual contractor received for their work takes a massive amount of effort… and then the available information often is less than satisfying.

As you can imagine, this is unfortunately the beginning of the corruption game. But equally as important, it is also the beginning of the inefficiency game. Honestly, just thinking about the numbers involved gives me the willies, and how to crack this problem? Forget about it.

Luckily for us that’s exactly what my guest for the 164th Terms of Reference Podcast thinks about and works on all day. Gavin Hayman is the Executive Director of the Open Contracting Partnership - an organization that seeks to open up public contracting through disclosure, data and engagement so that the huge sums of money involved are spent honestly, fairly, and effectively. And, as the former Executive Director of Global Witness, Gavin knows a thing or two about how to uncover unsavory practices of government contractors.

You’re going to love this episode where Gavin and I talk about the origins of the Open Contracting Partnership, the size of the issues they are trying to tackle and how we all benefit when governments (and contractors) get it right. And, personally, I was surprised by some of Gavin’s examples - their just not from where you’d expect to find massive transparency… and I think you will be as well.