The Nottingham City Council Commissioning and Procurement Executive Committee met on 15 April 2025 to discuss financial vulnerability funding and data network contract renewals. The committee approved a three-year grant for Advice Nottingham to support residents experiencing financial difficulties, and delegated authority to the Head of Service (IT) to enter into contracts for data network services.

Financial Vulnerability Funding

The committee approved spending £406,000 per year for three years, from 1 October 2025 to 30 September 2028, from the ringfenced Public Health Grant to fund information, advice and guidance services for people in Nottingham experiencing or at risk of financial difficulty. This totals £1,218,000. The committee also agreed to delegate authority to the Director of Public Health to approve the award and enter into a three-year grant agreement with Nottingham and District Citizens Advice Bureau on behalf of the Advice Nottingham consortium.

Bryany Cornish, Public Health Manager, and Helen Johnston, Public Health Registrar, presented the report, highlighting that levels of deprivation in Nottingham are associated with poor health and wellbeing outcomes. They noted that:

Increasingly, people who have never accessed benefits or advice in the past are seeking support (6.3% of the population in Nottingham now claim out-of-work benefits, a 2% rise since pre-pandemic), with lower income households (which make up nearly 20% of the local population) impacted even greater by high inflation of energy and food costs.

The funding will enable Advice Nottingham to deliver services aimed at preventing financial difficulty, resolving immediate financial problems and helping citizens to better manage their finances in the future.

Councillor Jay Hayes, Vice Chair, declared a pecuniary interest as Chair of the Advice Nottingham consortium and left the room during the discussion.

The committee considered other options, including:

• Running a competitive procurement process for a service contract, but this was rejected as not proportionate to the specialist knowledge of the advice sector.
• Continuing with an annual grant funding arrangement, but this was deemed detrimental to Advice Nottingham's ability to plan for the long term.
• Portioning the resource and awarding smaller grants to multiple local organisations, but this was not favoured as it could lead to gaps and inconsistencies in service provision.
• Discontinuing funding altogether, but this was rejected due to the increasing need for advice services and the potential negative impact on the health and wellbeing of vulnerable citizens.

Data Network Contract Renewals

The committee delegated authority to the Head of Service (IT) to enter into contracts to purchase data network services, in place by no later than October 2025 for a period of up to five years (2025/26 to 2029/30). The contracts will be awarded using approved procurement methods and will utilise a maximum of £4,000,000 from the IT Investment Fund.

Alex Billing, IT Infrastructure Manager, explained that the current contracts for voice and data networks, which enable the council to communicate and deliver online services, are expiring in 2025. The Council’s Financial Regulations require these services to be competitively tendered to ensure value for money.

The council will seek competitive bids using Crown Commercial Services (CCS). The estimated value of the contracts are:

• £250,000 for Internet connectivity
• £750,000 for Software Defined Wide Area Network (SD-WAN) functionality¹
• £3,000,000 for Wide Area Network (WAN) connectivity²

The committee considered and rejected the following alternative options:

• Reverting to having no voice and data networks, as this was not considered feasible.
• Developing its own voice and data network infrastructure, as this was also not considered feasible.
• Rolling over the existing contracts, as this would not comply with the Public Procurement Regulations 2015³ and would not enable the council to demonstrate value for money or access new technologies.