Purpose

This report requests that the Environment,
Climate Emergency and Transport Committee approves the purchase of
Parks Machinery, following a recent competitive tender exercise,
from the Parks Machinery Capital included in the Council's Capital
Programme.

Decision

Resolved – that the Director of
Neighbourhoods be authoried, following
the recent competitive tender exercise, to award the contracts to
purchase the Grounds Maintenance Machinery detailed in this report
from the highest scoring bidders in accordance with the Most
Economically Advantageous Tenderer Criteria.

Reasons for the decision

The Parks & Countryside Service use a wide
variety of machinery to maintain Wirral’s parks and open
spaces, play pitches, cemeteries, highway verges and beaches. The
majority of existing machinery is now 10 years old or older and has
reached the end of its useful life and needs to be replaced.
 
Provision for the purchase of Parks Machinery
was made in the 2019/20 Capital Programme agreed by Council on 4
March 2019. At that time, a three-year programme of procurement was
envisaged; however, due to delays in procurement as a result of
first the COVID Pandemic and then staff changes, procurement
activity only commenced from 2022. A total of £2,635,000
Capital has been included in the 2023/24 Capital Programme,
profiled over two years.
 
A competitive procurement exercise has been
undertaken using the TPPL (The Procurement Partnership Limited)
Framework.
 
The results of the tender exercise, the
preferred suppliers and cost for each item is provided in Appendix
1: Parks Machinery - Machinery Pricing & Scores.
 
In line with the Council Contract Procedural
Rules, given the overall value, this procurement needs to be
considered by the Environment, Climate Emergency & Transport
Committee and agreement received prior to purchase.

Alternative options considered

Do Nothing -The age of this machinery,
which is serviced and maintained by the Parks & Countryside
Workshop, is such that breakdowns are more frequent, which leads to
increased repair costs. Alongside increased repair costs the
service delivered suffers, due to increased down time, leading to
increased complaints from residents. The design of machinery has
improved over the past 10 years with new machinery being more fuel
efficient, reducing costs and emissions. Advances in material and
manufacturing technology have brought about improved designs of
hand-held and hand-guided machines with lower levels of vibration
emission, helping to reduce injuries such as hand-arm vibration
syndrome and carpel tunnel syndrome which can affect the health and
wellbeing of operators. Given these factors, a ‘do
nothing’ option is not believed to be viable.
 
Re-procurement from Capital –
Purchasing new replacement machinery, based on current and proposed
future methods of managing the estate, provides the benefits of
reduced downtime, reduced emissions and having the right machinery
for the job. New machinery would also assist in reducing
operators’ exposure to vibration, although regular monitoring
of operator exposure would still be required to manage the residual
risk. This is the preferred option.