Agenda item

Report of  the Assistant Chief Executive/Corporate Director  Strategy & Recourses and the Corporate Director Children & Adults

Lisa Lopez, Commissioning Manager, presented a report on the Sign Language Interpretation Service for Deaf Citizens highlighting the following points:

(a)  The existing contract is due to expire on 30 November 2018. The new contract will need to start on 1 December 2018 in order to ensure a continuous service for citizens;

(b)  This time Nottingham University Hospitals (NUH) will be included in the contract along with Nottingham City Council (NCC) and Nottinghamshire County Council. The contract use has been recalculated and will allow a small saving for NCC;

(c)  Going forward, those bidding for the tender will need to demonstrate how they will be able to build in assistive technology for situations where face to face interpretation is not necessary whilst ensuring citizens retain good levels of service and achieving good value for money;

RESOLVED to:

(1)  Approve the expenditure of £165,225 (for NCC’s service element of the contract) over the entirety of the contract term for the provision of the Sing Language Interpretation Services  (SLIS) detailed in appendix 1 of the report as published with the agenda;

(2)  Approve the procurement of the Sign Language Interpretation Service, detailed in Appendix 1 of the report as published with the agenda, jointly with Nottinghamshire County Council, NHS Clinical Commissioning  Group (CCG), Nottinghamshire County CCG (x5), and Nottingham University Hospital (NUH) through an appropriate procurement process, and to award the contract for the services based on the outcomes of the procurement process. The approved contract would commence on 1 December 2018 for a three year period with an option to extend on an annual basis for a further two years (i.e. 3+1+1), to a maximum of 5 years in total;

(3)  Delegate authority to the Head of Service for Contracting and Procurement to approve the outcome of the procurement processes and award the contract to the provider that is deemed most suitable to provide these services; and

(4)  Delegate authority to the Provider Performance and Development Manage to sign the final contract and agree annual extension on the basis of performance and budget availability. 

Reasons for decision

(1)  By providing a single signing interpretation service for access to Health and Social care services it allows more consistency for citizens, reduces time required for appointments and will help allow citizens a greater degree of privacy by reducing the number of people they disclose information to;

(2)  a single service gives more ease of booking and direct access for citizens and service providers and avoids confusion around which service to engage. This increases citizen satisfaction with the service, increase reliability and reduces the likelihood of appointments being cancelled. This in turn reduces time wasted by citizens and  services.

(3)  The re-tendering of the services allows Nottingham City Council to make a saving and improves value for money. It also includes an Out of Hours element which is important for health care services.

(4)  The retendering allows NCC to fulfil its statutory duties towards Deaf citizens by ensuring that reasonable adjustments are made to enable access to services.

Other options considered

There were three alternative options considered in this decision. The first was to make no changes to the service, to recommission the service as per the 2017/18 costs. This was rejected as recalculation of the costs showed that NCC would be able to make a small saving on the contract in line with current usage levels delivering better value for money.

The second option considered and rejected was to tender the service not including Nottinghamshire County Council, and CCG’s and NUH. This would not have allowed NCC to achieve the best value for money and would not provide as robust a contract for the provider. This model would also fail to deliver an integrated service for deaf citizens.

The last option available was to do nothing and to not recommission services. This was rejected as all services have a statutory obligation under the Equality Act 2010 to ensure reasonable adjustments are made to enable deaf people to use services.