Content

RESOLVED:
 
1. 
To approve the award of contract for consultancy
services for Phase One to accelerate our work on prevention and
demand management across our demand-led service areas to Provider B
as set out in Exempt Appendix 1. This contract will identify high
level business cases identifying significant financial
savings.
2. 
To delegate authority to the Group Director, Chief
Executive’s Directorate to award the  Phase Two services to Provider B , by use of a
compliant  direct award process.
 
Reason(s) For
Decision
 
This report sets out the proposed award of
contract  to Provider B to support the
Council to accelerate our Corporate Transformation and Savings
Identification. 
 
The Council faces the current Corporate
Transformation Programme targets delivery of  £21m over the next three financial
years.  This commission is a key part of
the council’s strategy to deliver this.
 
For phase one of this work, Provider B will
work with us to accelerate our work on prevention and demand
management across our demand-led service areas (Adult social care,
Children’s social care, Homelessness and Education,
specifically the special education needs and disabilities
cohort)  and to develop high level
business cases that can impact on outcomes for residents
and  identifying significant financial
savings.
 
Phase two will focus on implementation of the
business cases and will be awarded separately through direct
award.  Both phases are subject to
contract award approval through this Cabinet Procurement &
Insourcing Committee.
 
The scope of the work specified in this
contract award will explicitly exclude areas of our demand-led
services that have previously been subject to reviews, especially
where these have been supported by external providers. The
intention is to build upon work that has already been undertaken,
particularly where prevention and early intervention could
potentially reduce or delay the need for residents to access our
services.
 
The contract will utilise the specialist
knowledge, capacity and benchmarking data of Provider B to
undertake data analysis and a diagnostic exercise to identify
business cases which deliver significant financial
savings. 
 
Funding for this contract will rely on the
flexible use of capital receipts strategy,  approved by Full Council in February
2025. 
 
Alternative Options
Considered and Rejected
 
We have considered whether we could undertake
this work internally; however we do not have all the skills and in
addition capacity constraints and the financial imperative to
generate proposals to address the council’s budget challenge
in the short to medium term means that enhancing internal capacity
through recruitment is not an option. Doing nothing is also not an
option, due to the very significant financial challenges facing the
council. 
As part of the contract award, Provider B is
expected to work with the council to ensure knowledge transfer to
the internal corporate transformation team.  This will mean that they are able to deliver some
of the implementation activity internally.