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RESOLVED:
 
1. 
To approve the award of a contract for the Provision of
Family Time Services for Looked After Children, to Provider C, for
a maximum period of five years (3+1+1 years) at a cost of up to
£3,333,989.
 
Reasons For Decision
 
This report provides the Cabinet Procurement
Committee with the outcome of the procurement of a contract for the
Provision of Family Time Services for Looked After Children in
Hackney.
 
On 19th October 2023 the Council was notified
that the original provider had gone into administration. A new
provider was appointed and the service has continued to be
delivered without disruption. However, it was necessary to bring
forward the re-procurement of the service as set out in the
Business Case report previously agreed at Hackney Procurement Board
(Key Decision CE S399). The procurement process has now been
completed and the award of a contract is recommended as detailed in
this report.
 
Following the approval of the contract award,
Officers will proceed with the Implementation of the new contract
to commence operation by 1st September 2025.
 
The current outsourced service has continued
to demonstrate an ability to respond efficiently and effectively to
the demands on the service. At present the current provision is
contracted to deliver 14,000 hours of contact per year, however in
reality it is often 10-20% more. Therefore the new contact service provision will be
expected to deliver a minimum of 14,500 hours per annum. The
majority of the service will be delivered from the Ferncliff Centre, with a small amount held out of
the borough if that is appropriate for the child. 
 
The provider will work with the Hackney
Children’s Services management team to ensure that demand is
met, quality remains high and that contact is managed in the best
interests of children.
 
The current provider has indicated that TUPE
may apply to up to 18 permanent members of staff and 27 sessional
workers that may have acquired employment rights due to their
length of service. This will be further ratified during the
contract mobilisation stage.
 
 
Alternative Options
Considered and Rejected
 
The options considered and rejected for this
procurement included:
 
1. 
Do nothing.
2. 
To procure a Framework Agreement.
3. 
Insourcing.
 
Option 1 - Do nothing: This
option is unacceptable as the local authority has a statutory duty
to promote contact between children looked after and their parents,
carers, siblings and extended family members.
 
Option 2 - To procure a Framework
Agreement: This option involves outsourcing the Family Time
Service to a number of providers via framework agreement; this
option may provide a competitive market for service delivery but
carries a risk of inconsistent service delivery, additional
administration from liaising with multiple suppliers and additional
contract management obligations to the Council. This approach would
also fail to achieve the same economies of scale as a single
supplier contract.
 
Option 3 - Insourcing: This
option entails integrating all Family Time Services, by bringing
the provision back in-house. This would require the Council to TUPE
the existing provider’s staff, align their wage/salary
structure to Council pay scales with associated on-costs and
provide training on an on-going basis to ensure staff are kept
abreast of the developments in the industry. The Council would need
to recruit a pool of sessional staff to deliver the service under
the supervision of an on-site manager. Given that staff will always
have an option of accepting individual sessional assignments, the
Council would need to recruit, train and maintain a much larger
pool of staff than the number for whom regular work could be
offered in order to ensure that staff would always be available
when family time is scheduled. This option would therefore increase
costs and management time, including for example additional HR
support to manage the needs of the new workers. The Council would
incur an additional estimated cost of £269k per annum which
represents a 40% increase to the current cost of the service.
 
An in-house service also lacks the
independence of an external provider which can be beneficial when
cases are considered in court and evidence around contact is
required.
 
A detailed report on the opportunities and
challenges for insourcing was completed and is provided as
Exempt Appendix 1.