Guidance on personal and prejudicial interests is attached to these agenda pages.

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Members of the public may, if the Board Member agrees, ask a question of the Board Member on any item for decision on this agenda (other than on the minutes). The full text of any question must be notified to the Head of Law and Governance by no later than 9.30 am two clear working days before the meeting. Questions by the public will be taken as read and, at the Board

Member’s discretion, responded to either orally or in writing at the meeting. No supplementary question or questioning will be permitted.

The total time permitted for this item will be 15 minutes.

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City Councillors may, at the Board Member’s discretion, ask a question or address the Board Member on an item for decision on the agenda (other than on the minutes). The full text of any question and the nature of any address must be notified to the Head of Law and Governance by no later than 9.30 am two clear working days before the meeting. Questions by councillors will be taken as read and, at the Board Member’s discretion, responded to either orally or in writing at the meeting. No supplementary question or questioning will be permitted. If an address is made, the Board member will either respond or have regard to the points raised in reaching her or his decision. If the address is by the Chair of a Scrutiny Committee or her or his nominee then the Board member will be required to say as part of their decision whether they accept the Scrutiny recommendations made.

Councillor McCready asked the following question:-

‘When will the Council’s reflections on practices in other areas and the resulting quality criteria for assessing tenders be available for scrutiny so that councillors may know what ‘tough love’ for rough sleepers will amount to?’

The Board Member responded as follows:-

‘The tender had been scored on a 65:35 weighting, with 65% allocated to the quality of the tender and 35% to the price.

The tender followed the open procedure where the pre-qualification section and tender questions are contained in the same document.  If any tenderer failed the pre qualification section (which assessed the organisations finances, health and safety, environmental, business continuity, equalities and CSR credentials) then they would not be progressed to the tender evaluation stage – in any event all tenderers passed.

The tender document comprised 29 qualitative questions.  The majority of the scoring was centred around the questions requesting method statements that demonstrated the organisations approach to outreach and capacity to deliver a consistent service.  It also included the submission of two case studies that could show where the organisation had delivered similar services before.  The questions aimed to extract information about previous successes that the organisations had when working with entrenched rough sleepers with complex needs.

The second stage of the tender process involved the short listed organisations attending a clarification interview.  The reason for the second stage was so that the panel could question the organisations on any element of their tender proposal.  This approach always helped to get beneath the “slick bid writing” façade that sometimes prevailed. The panel also got to meet the people who, if successful, would be delivering the service.  Organisations were informed that the panel may choose to use any information that had been clarified to re-visit their previous scoring on the bid.’

The Board Member permitted supplementary questioning and Councillor McCready pressed for responses specifically on best practice and the application of quality criteria in assessing tenders.  The Board Member responded by explaining that the new provider would adopt a similar approach, but more effectively, to the present provider.  The street outreach team would seek out rough sleepers and encourage them at the time to move to overnight accommodation.  The approach to be used had been probed in the course of the interview process.

This report invites the Board Member to delegate authority to the Executive Director, Housing and regeneration to enter into a new Street Services and Reconnection Service contract for three years with the option of a two year extension at the Council’s discretion.

The Head of Business Improvement submitted a report (previously circulated, now appended).

Resolved to delegate authority to the Head of Housing and Communities to enter into a new Street Services and Reconnection Service contract for three years with the option of a two year extension at the complete discretion of the Council, it being noted that the contract would contain break clauses to terminate the contract early without penalties if that proved necessary.