Agenda item

Report of the Director of Public Health and the Director of Commissioning and Procurement

Chris Wallbanks, Strategic Commissioning Manager, presented a report to the Sub Committee on the extension of Health Visitor and School Nursing contracts.

The recommendations in the report are for an extension of the existing service, and to award directly to CityCare for the children's element, subject to consultation with Councillor Graham Chapman as the Portfolio Holder for Resources and Neighbourhood regeneration. The reason for the extension is to ensure those services are maintained, whilst the review is put into place to move towards an integrated service. One of the reasons for the delay is because Nottingham City Council is looking into a new and innovative model of procurement, and hoping to reduce the contract values going forward.

The Sub Committee added that keeping the message of the integrated service as simple as possible is important. The size of the resource is tremendous, and it is important to ensure the review is complete correctly. It is a chance to do something that will be right for the children of Nottingham and their parents for decades to come if it is done right.

RESOLVED to:

(1)  approve the extension of the Public Health contracts listed in exempt Appendix 1 to the report, for up to 1 year from 1 April 2017 – 31 March 2018, at a cost not exceeding current contract values;

(2)  approve dispensation from sections 5.1.1 and 5.1.2 of the Council’s Contract Procedure Rules, in accordance with section 3.29 of the Council’s Financial Regulations, in respect of the Public Health contracts indicated in exempt Appendix 1 – in consultation with the Chief Finance Officer and the Portfolio Holder for Resources and Neighbourhood regeneration;

(3)  approve the issuing of a direct award to Nottingham CityCare Partnership for the Children’s Public Health Nutrition Service from 1 April 2017-31 March 2018, at a cost of £79,000;

(4)  delegate authority to the Director of Public Health in consultation with the Portfolio Holder of Adults and Health, to agree the final values and award contracts for the services listed in exempt Appendix 1 to the report, providing these do not exceed current contract values;

(5)  delegate authority to the Head of Contracting and Procurement to sign the final contracts and contract extensions in respect of all services detailed in exempt Appendix 1 to the report, following approval by the Director of Public Health to the agreed contract awards;

(6)  approve the budget to support the contractual values set out in exempt Appendix 1 to the report (if the contractual values are over and above current indicative values a separate report will be presented for approval).

Reasons for decision

(1)  Extending the contracts listed in exempt Appendix 1, for one year will ensure that access to essential public health services and the continuity of service provision is maintained for children and families whilst the Child Development Strategic Commissioning Review work is completed and recommendations arising from review work during 2017/18 are implemented in a timely manner.

(2)  The Child Development Review Team has reviewed these commissioned services and recommended that one integrated service be procured in order to allow the provider to develop an innovative and flexible approach to delivering the existing functions which is free from historic service divisions and offers the opportunity for a more efficient and streamlined service, responsive to the needs of children and their families.

Other options considered

(1)  Do nothing. This option was rejected as this would mean that existing contracts for these services would expire in March 2017, leaving the city without essential public health services.  Two of the contracts listed in the exempt appendix deliver mandatory aspects of the Healthy Child Programme.

(2)  Re-procuring all services immediately for new contracts to commence in April 2017. This option was rejected as it would allow insufficient time to explore the potential benefits and enhanced efficiencies of integrating children’s services and other partnership delivery models.  It is essential that procurement is not undertaken before the long term strategy for all services detailed in the exempt appendix is agreed. Extending current activity for one year will enable service delivery and value for money benefits arising from the commissioning reviews to be realised as quickly as possible.  It will also avoid the risk of destabilising current health services and reducing the quality of current provision to citizens.

(3)  De-commissioning the children’s function of the Public Health Nutrition Team until the broader integrated service specification is ready to be procured in 2017/18 risks the disintegration of an expert team and a valuable service to our families and the workforce. For this reason, this option was rejected.