SS16066 – Highways Term Maintenance Contract (HTMC)

Background
Kent County Council (the Council) is the largest county council in England covering an area of 3,500 square kilometres. It has an annual expenditure of over £900m on goods and services and a population of 1.3m. The Council provides a wide range of personal and strategic services on behalf of its residents, operating in partnership with 12 district councils and 305 parish/town councils. The Council is responsible for maintaining over 8700km of carriageways and 6300km of footways across the County.

The Council’s current Highways Term Maintenance Contract is due to expire on the 31 August 2018 and therefore has commenced a commissioning project to evaluate potential delivery models. Currently with the ‘plan’ phase of the commissioning cycle, the business will be seeking corporate approval of one of the following options:

• Extend the current arrangement with the incumbent contractor for up to a maximum three year period and commission a new machine resurfacing contract.
• Commission a large scale contract that incorporates all services as detailed in this notice.
• Commission a number a contracts that includes a core highway maintenance contract and a number of separate arrangements for specialist services.

Corporate approval will be sought on the week commencing the 25 September 2017. Should the decision be to procure a new arrangement, a procurement process will commence following the closure of this Prior Information Notice (PIN). Any potential new arrangement will last for a minimum initial period of five to seven years with potential extension periods.

The Opportunity
The Council requires a contractor to assist it in the delivery of its highway services across the county. The scope of any potential contract will include the following services from items 1 to 18 below and may include items 19 to 21 subject to the development of the contract:

1. Winter service provision – including pre-salting, post salting, snow and ice clearance to the highway network in accordance with our policy.
2. Routine maintenance of bridges and subways
3. Structure improvement schemes
4. Routine maintenance of highways and footways including potholes
5. Patching and small resurfacing schemes to footways and carriageways with various asphalt materials
6. Emergency response and out of hours to incidents on the highway network, including weather emergencies,
7. Provision, installation, removal and maintenance of vehicle restraint fencing, pedestrian guardrail, posts, ironwork, unlit bollards and other items of street furniture
8. Drainage installation and repairs
9. Tunnel and pump maintenance including tunnel manager support
10. Provision, installation, maintenance & removal of road studs, road markings
11. Provision, maintenance, cleaning & removal of non-illuminated road signs
12. Provision and maintenance of traffic management
13. General maintenance of kerbing works, slab and brick works, guard railings, signs and reactive hand lining
14. Highway related environmental improvement activities
15. Dealing with flytipping and environmental spills
16. Delivery of high speed road programme
17. Highway schemes delivery including construction of smaller civils and traffic related schemes
18. Provide support for highway minor schemes through walk, talk and build, Early Contractor Involvement and full design or environment consultancy for works on the highway

19. Drainage Maintenance including gully cleansing and drainage investigation
20. Surface Treatments including surface dressing, high friction surfacing, micro asphalts and slurry sealing
21. Machine Resurfacing including major surfacing works that may include reconstruction of the highway

Process
The Council is using a PIN as a means of Calling for Competition and this will initially be run alongside an Expression of Interest. A Selection Questionnaire (SQ) is scheduled to be released on 28 September 2017 if the appropriate corporate approval has been obtained to conduct a procurement process.

Following the SQ, an ITT will be released in October 2017 and will run until January 2018. It is the Council’s intention to use a Competitive Procedure with Negotiation where the Negotiation period will take place in February 2018. The Council may award contracts on the basis of the initial tenders without negotiation.

If required, the Council will reduce the number of candidates invited to submit tenders using the criteria within the SQ. Between five and eight bidders will be shortlisted to progress to the ITT. After initial tender submission, the Council may reduce the number of candidates invited to negotiate using the criteria within the Award Criteria.

Selection and Award Criteria
The Council shall base the award of this contract on the most economically advantageous tender with regard to price and quality. Full details can be found in the tender documentation.

Market engagement overview
During March to July 2017 the Council completed a Market Engagement with a number of interested parties.

The aims of the Market Engagement Event were as follows:
• In conjunction with the County Council’s procurement requirements, the Directorate is committed to encouraging active engagement with the market;
• Give potential providers the opportunity to understand some of the complexities of the services, particularly relating to budget and environmental mitigation challenges that will need to be addressed;
• The directorate teams will have the opportunity to explain the specific requirements and constraints of the services;
• Potential providers will gain an understanding of the commitment required for ‘business continuity’ as part of the service delivery the County Council undertakes;
• The County Council will understand the current thinking from the market, particularly around determining the best strategy for these services.

The Market Engagement Event was designed to gather knowledge for the business in the following areas:
• Feasibility: whether what is sought is feasible;
• Capability: the ability of the market to achieve what is required;
• Maturity: Whether there is an established market for the requirement, and whether there are enough suppliers in existence for a competitive procurement.
• Capacity: Can the market achieve what is required quickly enough, or on a large enough scale?

The following documents have been attached which may be of interest to those that expressed an interest, took part in the market engagement events, or are interested in this opportunity:
• Market Engagement Feedback Presentation
• Market Engagement Event Document
• Market Engagement Event Presentation

Contract Access
The contract will be open to be used by any public sector organisation within the County of Kent, including but not limited to the following:

• Ashford Borough Council
• Canterbury City Council
• Dartford Borough Council
• Dover District Council
• Gravesham Borough Council
• Maidstone Borough Council
• Medway Council
• Sevenoaks District Council
• Shepway District Council
• Swale Borough Council
• Thanet District Council
• Tonbridge and Malling Borough Council
• Tunbridge Wells Borough Council
• Kent Parish Councils

Expression of Interest and Tender Process
Expressions of interest will only be accepted via the Kent Business Portal. In order to submit your interest in this opportunity please select the ‘Login and Express an Interest’ button located at the bottom of this page.

Note that in order to successfully submit your interest you will first need to register for an account. After registration is complete and you've received your login details you should return to the advert for the opportunity and express your interest.

Initially, a PIN and Expression of Interest are being released. These are expected to run until 5pm on Wednesday 27 September 2017 at which point you will be given access to the SQ.

Access to the SQ will be made available to those that expressed an interest from 28 September 2017 and will run until 13 October 2017. These times are subject to changes due to internal corporate approval.

It is intended to hold a bidder’s commencement day after ITT release and a bidder’s workshop during November 2017. Further details will be released nearer the time.

Indicative Procurement Timetable
PIN Release / Call for Competition / OJEU 17-Aug-17
Internal corporate approval w/c 25-Sep-17
PIN closes 27-Sep-17 (5pm)
SQ issued 28-Sep-17
SQ submission 13-Oct-17
SQ evaluation begins 13-Oct-17
SQ Evaluation Complete 20-Oct-17
ITT released w/c 16-Oct-17
Clarification request deadline w/c 8-Jan-18
ITT deadline w/c 15-Jan-18
ITT evaluation period Jan-18
Negotiation period Feb-18
- Negotiation meetings
- ITT revisions
- ITT submissions
- Revised ITT evaluation
Corporate approvals period Mar-18
Estimated Contract Award date Mar-18
Mobilisation starts Apr-18
Mobilisation ends 31-Aug-18
New delivery arrangements/contracts start 01-Sep-18

Questions and Communication
Please direct all questions and communication through the Kent Business Portal ‘Messages’ facility.