Councillor Sean Gaul, Cabinet Member for Children and Young People, approved the recommendation to extend contracts for Young Peoples Supported Accommodation (YPSA) services. These contracts, which provide support and accommodation for young people aged 16-25 in Oxfordshire, were set to expire on 30 September 2025. The decision delegates authority to the Director of Children's Services, in consultation with the Deputy Monitoring Officer and Head of Legal and Governance, to extend the YPSA contracts for 18 months, from 1 October 2025 to 30 April 2027.

Young Peoples Supported Accommodation (YPSA) - Contract Extensions

The Cabinet Member for Children and Young People approved the extension of the YPSA contracts for 18 months, from 1 October 2025 to 30 April 2027. The Public Reports Pack states that these contracts provide 203 units of support and accommodation across Oxfordshire, delivered by six providers. The services are for young people aged 16-25, and include shared accommodation, self-contained single accommodation, and accommodation for parents and children.

The YPSA aims to help young people in Oxfordshire gain independence skills, access education, employment, or training, and make informed choices about their accommodation options. The YPSA also supports care leavers as part of the Children Act guidance and regulations Volume 3: Planning transition to adulthood for care leavers .

The report notes that a review of the YPSA was completed in late 2024 with internal and external stakeholders, including providers and young people.

The council commissions the majority of its YPSA services for young people aged over 18 (16+ for parents) from six providers:

• Connection Support
• Stonewater
• A2 Dominion
• Sanctuary
• Response
• Homegroup

The YPSA contract supports both care leavers who are the responsibility of Oxfordshire County Council, and young people aged 18+ who are not care experienced. The City and District Councils pay the council for any beds utilised up to an agreed limit set by the City and District Councils, which is currently approximately £400k per year.

Not all of the current contracts will be extended. Reasons for this include low occupancy numbers due to location and type of provision, and low waiting lists. There are 20 young people living in these identified services, with decommissioning plans in place for each young person to take into account their individual housing and support needs.

Oxfordshire County Council and the District and City Councils could, if necessary, consider discretionary spot purchase of a placement on a limited and case-by-case basis after 1 October 2025 to avoid homelessness if necessary, up to a period of up 6 months.

Reducing the number of surplus beds on the YPSA is also contributing to a key Council wide savings plan for 2025/26.

Extending the 18+ YPSA contracts would allow sufficient time to remodel and recommission these services. The 18-month extension will provide ample time to engage with stakeholders, including the District/City Councils and the young people themselves, service providers, and social care staff.

A number of variations will be made to the extended contracts to provide clarifications and also include revised age range changes to reduce the age limit for new referrals only from 25 to 21 years of age. A plan is in place jointly with providers and the District and City Councils for young people to support them to move on if they no longer require supported housing via the private rented sector or via the relevant district/city housing register. Young people will not be made homeless as a result of being aged over 21 years; however, the service will no longer accept referrals for any young person into the service aged 21+.

If the contracts were not extended on 30 September 2025, for the majority of young people housed in the YPSA there would be no alternative option for accommodating the young people and would therefore risk the young people becoming homeless.

The collective annual budget for 2025/26 and 2026/27 is £4,335,883. £2,146,476 for year 1 and £2,189,406 for year 2 taking into account a 2% uplift. These contracts are for support only, accommodation costs are funded by young people and for the majority this is via Housing Benefit payments.

The report lists the contracts that will be extended:

The Council's statutory duties to provide support services and accommodation for the categories of young people defined in the relevant contracts are set out in the Children Act 1989 and the Children (Leaving Care) Act 2000 as defined in the Pathway Plan to support their assessed needs.

From a procurement law perspective, the contract extensions are permitted under the terms and conditions of the original contracts and are therefore compliant with the Council's Contract procedure Rules and the Public Contract Regulations 2015.

For services that are not being extended/reduced on 1 October there will be staff redundancies and this process is being managed by the provider.

For those affected by de-commissioning of services and changes to the upper age limit, implementation plans are in place to safely move young people into alternative accommodation arrangements based on their identified need and legal status and homelessness will be avoided at all costs.

The report identifies the benefits and risks of extending the contracts: