Decision details

The Cabinet Member for Corporate Affairs and HR presented a report to Cabinet which provided details of the proposal to Procure a Water Hygiene Monitoring Services for the Prevention of Legionella. 

The Cabinet Member reported that he contract is for the period 01 July 2024 to 30 June 2027 with a possible extension option for a further 2 years.

This contract provides prevention of Legionella compliance to all council-controlled properties, schools that buy into the service and buildings occupied by Persona and Six Town Housing. There are 209 properties with the current contract, comprising of: 57 Schools, 11 Persona Buildings, 20 Six Town Housing managed properties and 121 council-controlled buildings.

This contract is managed through Architectural Services and is a traded service which is recharged out to individual client departments, schools that buy into the service and ALMO’s such as Persona and Six Town Housing.

Recommendation(s)

Cabinet:

1.    Approves the use of the ESPO Framework Agreement to procure the councils Water Hygiene Monitoring Service contract for the period 01 July 2024 to 30 June 2027 with a possible extension for a further 2 years. The council will use the framework by conducting a further competition exercise.

2.    Notes that a further report will be presented to Cabinet following the completion of the mini - competition process with an award recommendation.

Reasons for recommendation(s)

The proposed arrangements ensure that the Council has a fully compliant water hygiene monitoring service provider in place.

The framework offers the council access to a choice of pre-approved, industry compliant water hygiene monitoring service providers where all supplier staff have been fully DBS checked and approved.

All suppliers on the framework have been pre-checked for financial stability, track record, experience and technical and professional ability.

Framework is fully compliant with UK procurement regulations, the EU procurement directive and the councils contract procedure rules. Advice from the council’s procurement team has been sought.

Framework offers the option of conducting a further competition exercise from all suppliers, this can be tailored to the council’s specific requirements with the ability to tender for best value split between price and quality.

Social Value can and will be incorporated into the further competition exercise. This will form part of the quality assessment and will carry a 10% weighting in the award criteria.

The framework is free and available for use by any public body in the UK this includes Local Authority Establishments. ESPO is a public sector owned professional buying organisation (PBO), specialising in providing a wide range of goods and services to the public sector.

Alternative options considered and rejected

Option 2 - Carry out the water hygiene monitoring service in house.

This option is currently not feasible as the council does not have the labour capacity, suitably trained staff or the necessary IT infrastructure to carry out a service such as this. In order for this option to work the council would need to invest in additional resources both in staff, training, hardware and software requirements and was therefore determined as not a financially viable solution.

Option 3 - Carry out an open tender procurement exercise.

This option was considered and is possible, however this would involve significantly more time and costs in the procurement process as a whole and for no real benefit. The use of this framework is free and ensures that all suppliers have been evaluated and approved based on their capabilities, expertise, and compliance within required criteria along with pre-negotiated terms and conditions. Further competition exercise enables the council to tailor the service requirements to the council’s specific needs. There are little or no benefits to going out to open tender over using this framework and as a result this option was dismissed.