This meeting was scheduled to discuss an application from the Waltham Forest School’s Catering Service to award a contract for the supply of frozen and ambient foods. The meeting was not open to the public.

Procurement of Frozen and Ambient Foods

The Waltham Forest School’s Catering Service was seeking approval to procure a £2,000,000 contract for frozen and ambient foods. The report prepared for the meeting argued that this would “assist the Catering service to provide a service for schools in Waltham Forest to meet their combined statutory requirements in providing meals for all pupils in the borough.” The report explains that “The spend is covered by the income derived from the sale of Universal Infant Free School Meals and now for Key Stage 2, from the Mayor’s Meals Scheme.”

The report goes on to explain that the preferred option was to “call-off from” an existing “framework agreement” managed by Havering Council, because this would deliver “best value due to economies of scale”. The report says that The combined spending power of the...councils which form the authorities using the framework ensures that when the market was approached it was an attractive tender and would deliver value for money for the participating members. The report explains that the framework agreement was established in 2021 following a “thorough tender process involving multiple bids”.

The report considers, and rejects a number of alternative options. Doing nothing, was rejected because “the catering provision must continue and is a statutory requirement for the schools”. Proceeding with a “bespoke procurement” was rejected because it would not “deliver economies of scale” and therefore not deliver “value for money”.

The report notes that the contract would be funded by central government and the Greater London Authority.

An equality assessment, included in the report pack, found that there was no negative equality impact as a result of the proposals in the report.