contracts

DWP has announced that it is inviting suppliers to bid for Low Value Welfare to Work training provision("LVP"). A new system for securing packages of this welfare to work related training will begin from 22nd March 2010.

The DWP has released the results of the PQQ stage of commissioning these two programmes across 19 Contract Package Areas.

The DWP today announced the successful suppliers who have passed the PQQ stage for round 2 of Community Task Force. The organisations listed are mainly well established non-profit suppliers but a number of larger commercial contractors are in the list too.

The DWP has published the list of short-listed suppliers for two Contract Package areas: North and North East London; and Hampshire, Isle of Wight and Thames Valley.

Updated 10/12 - This story started out as a list of all subcontractors for everyone everywhere on FND1, but thanks to an FoI response received by Steph at W2W Solutions, and some judicious reconstruction of redacted information, we've now got a complete list of which providers put which subcontractors in each area. These are the lists that were included at the point of tendering, and not the ones that have actually ended up delivering in each area.

I've got a request in progress for an up to date list, broken down by prime and CPA. In the meantime, be aware that some primes had to redo their subcontracting pretty much from scratch after winning FND.

A slightly surprising announcement has been posted on the DWP site informing providers looking to deliver contracts of less than £50,000 that an electronic procurement system is rolling out nationally over the next few months. Providers will be able to put their details online, and receive Requests for Quotation directly from DWP procurement staff. The idea is to make the procurement process simpler and easier when the DWP want to buy a few days of training, a one-off course or similar.

Following a rash of stories about contract fraud and failure in the press earlier this year, the Work and Pensions Select Committee announced an inquiry into the management and administration of contracted employment programmes. Interested parties were invited to make submissions.

FND phase 1, due for launch across half the country in October, has had its expected throughflows cut by 35% across all contracts. This follows on from the approximate doubling in expectations that occurred earlier this year, so the expected number of customers is still slightly greater than the initial FND tenders.

Carley Consult have won the Merlin tender to develop a support and monitoring regime for prime contracting. The rumours were confirmed when the contract win was announced on the EU contracts database and Supply2.gov this morning. However, Carley Consult refused to comment when contacted.

Reproduced verbatim from the Parliament website

The Work and Pensions Committee today announced an inquiry into “Management and administration of contracted employment programmes” The Committee welcomes submissions, in accordance with the guidelines set out below, with reference to areas such as:

• Are there sufficient safeguards in place to prevent providers from making fraudulent claims for outcomes they have not achieved?

Ever since Indus Delta started up, a major theme and recurring bugbear of the site has been the publication and analysis of welfare to work performance figures. After two years and a constant stream of Freedom of Information requests and leaked data, it appears the quest may be nearing its end.

[Updated 30/6 - Contract specification now attached]
[Updated 31/7 - Angus Knight and i2i have withdrawn from this round]

The PQQ results of Jobcentre Plus Support Contracts have been released. I've put them in a handy sortable table to make it easier to figure out who won what where. Supposedly, these will be running from December 2009, and are due to replace Programme Centres and various other bits of support, and provide a way for JCP advisers to call on provider services before the 12 month FND entry kicks in.

For those who haven't checked in the last day or so, the ESF round results have finally been released. The table of shortlisted bidders is in pdf form, and I'll translate it and put it on the site as soon as I get chance. In the meantime, here's the official announcement, lifted from the DWP site under that handy Crown copyright:

The results, announced on 29/5/09, are:

Preferred Provider	Contract area
A4e	Black Country
A4e	Cambridgeshire and Suffolk, Norfolk and Lincolnshire & Rutland
A4e	Central London, Lambeth Southwark & Wandsworth
A4e	North and East Yorkshire and Humber and Tees Valley
A4e	South Yorkshire and Derbyshire
Calder	Central London, Lambeth Southwark & Wandsworth
Dudley MBC	Black Country
Max Employment	Surrey, Sussex and Kent
Mentor	Birmingham and Solihull
PPDG	Coventry and Warwickshire, The Marches and Staffordshire
Remploy	South Yorkshire & Derbyshire
Seetec	Birmingham and Solihull
Serco	Coventry and Warwickshire, The Marches and Staffordshire
Serco	Greater Manchester Central and Greater Manchester East and West
Serco	North and Mid Wales and South East Wales
Skills Training	Surrey, Sussex and Kent
TNG	Cambridgeshire and Suffolk, Norfolk and Lincolnshire & Rutland
Wise Group	Edinburgh, Lothian and Borders, Lanarkshire and East Dunbartonshire, Ayrshire Dumfries, Galloway and Inverclyde
WorkDirections	Edinburgh, Lothian and Borders, Lanarkshire and East Dunbartonshire, Ayrshire Dumfries, Galloway and Inverclyde
WorkDirections	Leicestershire, Northamptonshire and Nottinghamshire
Working Links	Devon and Cornwall
Working Links	Leicestershire, Northamptonshire and Nottinghamshire
Working Links	North and East Yorkshire and Humber and Tees Valley
Working Links	South Wales Valleys and South West Wales

This article builds on the analysis and explanations in Indus Delta's 2006-07 New Deal performance analysis. The figures used in this article cover every New Deal and Programme Centre contract in the country over the course of an entire year, end of March 2008 to end of March 2009. However, there are major added complexities on top of those faced in the previous analysis, that make a simple comparison table less useful.