Tendering for contracts: Public Services (Social Value) Act 2012

It has recently been announced that this new piece of legislation will come into full effect at the end of this month.

How will this affect you when it comes to tendering for contracts?

• If the contracts you tender for are primarily above the EU threshold for public procurement rules, then you should be prepared for a change in the scoring and marking criteria for the PQQs and tenders that you complete.
• All other contracts will be conducted under the Best Value Statutory Guidance for local authorities, these are predominantly smaller contracts under the threshold.
• Contracts put out to tender by Housing Associations will also be conducted under the HCA VFM Regulations in England and the Welsh Government regulation of RSLs in Wales for those in Wales, as well as the new Social Value Act, when the contract value is above the threshold.

From February onwards, all contracting authorities including public authorities and bodies governed by public law, such as Housing Associations, will be required to consider all of the elements of this act when they begin to plan and define the process of procuring service contracts.

The overall emphasis of the act is that there will be a requirement to reflect and refer regarding social value before making the contract award decision. The act states that consideration should be made as to whether the service offering from potential suppliers will deliver improvements in the socio-economic and environmental well-being of the area where the services will be delivered. Although this does not contradict EU Public Procurement rules, the EU itself is currently considering changing these rules in order to widen the scope of precisely what social value can be taken into consideration when awarding contracts.

If you are not currently incorporating any essence of social value into your tender submissions, now is certainly the time to start thinking about initiatives you can implement and what benefits you are going to be able to deliver to the local community in which the contract is to be delivered. We are expert bid writers who have a wealth of experience in helping our clients to deliver both added and social value, and we are looking forward to seeing this as a mandatory inclusion in many of our tender submissions going forward.

Should you feel that you need assistance in demonstrating how you will deliver added and social value in your next tender submission, please do not hesitate to call us today!