Issue - meetings

Report of the Director of Culture, Strategy, and Engagement. To be introduced by the Cabinet Member for Culture, Communities & Leisure.

Request to award the contract to preferred provider for the Capacity Building Partner for the Voluntary and Community Sector.

The Cabinet Member for Culture, Communities & Leisure introduced the report which detailed the outcome of an open tender process and sought approval to award the contract to the successful tenderer for the Provision of Capacity Building Partner for the Voluntary and Community Sector (VCS) in Haringey in accordance with Contract Standing Order (CSO) 9.07.1 (d).

The Cabinet Member highlighted the following:

-      The voluntary and charitable sector in Haringey played a vital role across the borough, supporting residents and providing services to different communities and the Council were committed to supporting the sector and to support a provider to provide advice and support.

-      The Council had redesigned the service specification to better meet the needs of the sector, and this had been informed through engagement with that sector.

-      The contract focused more strongly on capacity building and set out clear and transparent accountability to both the Council and the wider sector, ensuring equitable access to support and external funding opportunities.

-      The Council had carried out a robust and thorough open tender process toward a new contract to a provider who submitted a strong bid outlining their experience, expertise and commitment to providing services required and the outcomes specified in the tender documents.

-      Delivery against the contract will be regularly monitored, monitored on a quarterly basis to ensure key performance indicators were met and service outcomes were delivered.

-      Agreement was being sought to award this contract for three years starting on the 1st of April 2024.

In response to questions from Cllr da Costa, the following information was provided.

-      The Council were looking for a provider in a niche market as there were few organisations that are able to meet the contract specification. However, out of the organisations that did tender for this bid, they had set out some really strong outcomes that the Council want to deliver and to support the voluntary sector across Haringey in the future.

-      Regarding making contract monitoring performance publicly available, the Council would be working with the provider to develop a clear suite of public reporting indicators. The Council wanted the successful winning bidder partner to work with the voluntary sector to agree what the sector feels are the important outcomes that really mattered to them and then to agree what the mechanism of reporting and transparency would be. Therefore, the intention was to develop the performance indicators with the sector and with the  partner once appointed.

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Further to considering exempt information at item 19,

RESOLVED

1. To approve the award of a contract to the successful tenderer, for the Provision of Capacity Building Partner for the Voluntary and Community Sector, in accordance with Contract Standing Order (CSO) 9.07.1(d). The successful bidder is identified under Appendix 1 - Part B (exempt information) of this report).

2. To approve the contract award for a period of three (3) years, commencing 1st April 2024 to 31st March 2027, with option to extend for further periods of up to  ...  view the full minutes text for item 68