I thought that 'lowest bidder wins' was an American phenomenon? Certainly, Boeing and others have figured out how to game the system here in the states and abroad.
My german architect clients say: “Ze lowest bidder wins to start ze project with ze highest bidder’s plans.” Which is funny when you squint enough to ignore the tragedy.
I'm European ... and I upvoted you. They sold us the EU as a big brotherhood of the European people, instead we got a giant bureaucracy at the service of big corpo.