Norway: Contracting out Property and Facility Services in Norwegian Municipalities

Abstract

Contracting out property and facilities services in the public sector has a strong focus in Norway these days, as the politicians are looking for ways to achieve higher efficiency and to reduce activities in the public sector not directly related to the core businesses for local and central government. In this article we give a brief overview of the situation regarding restructuring of the management of property management and facilities services in the Norwegian municipalities, with an emphasis on contracting out services to private suppliers, either by out-tasking or outsourcing these services. In general, the “facilities management” evolution within the Norwegian municipalities is moving slowly. Although the tendency is to go in the direction of sourcing out services, a lot of municipalities are choosing to retain most facilities management services in-house, either as a municipal enterprise or as a share-holding company which is wholly or partly owned by the municipality. On the whole, out-tasking is more common than outsourcing. Contracting out single services such as cleaning to a professional cleaning agency or canteen facilities to a catering firm is becoming more common in the municipal workplace. A possible and highly likely reason for this is that the concept of facilities management is a new one, and there are not many private businesses offering such services, whether as single services or as total facilities management deals.