1617-0566 Islington Integrated Drug and Alcohol Recovery Service

Islington Council invites suitable expressions of interest from suppliers for the delivery of an integrated substance misuse recovery service for adults misusing drugs or alcohol.


Background
Treatment services, in scope of this major service redesign, are currently delivered through nine contracts. The new contract will bring these services together under one contract, in order to create a significantly different approach to recovery which offers a more integrated, seamless pathway, ensuring consistent care and providing the right kind of expert support at the right time.


The requirement
This contract is for a single, integrated drug and alcohol recovery service. The preferred option is for the service to be arranged over two premises in Islington. The successful provider will also need to develop relationships with partners across the borough to ensure that local community assets (e.g. community centres, GP surgeries) are used for service provision. The premise(s) will be the responsibility of the service provider.

The London Borough of Islington is committed to co-production of services. Service user involvement will be a key element of the integrated drug and alcohol service. Service users will be involved in the design, development and delivery of the service and will be integral in describing outcome measures for any changes to the delivery model. The provider will have comprehensive plans to ensure that the service is flexible in responding to need, is developed in conjunction with service users, and that there is routine and regular assessment of the efficiency and quality of service offered which is undertaken by both the provider and service users.

The integrated drug and alcohol service will have a strong focus on recovery from the beginning and throughout a service user’s treatment journey. The integrated service will support service users to develop / strengthen the personal assets which will enable them to recover their quality of life, and will not simply focus on recovery from drug and alcohol use.

Families will be a key consideration in the integrated service. As well as developing close relationships with Children’s Services, the provider will ensure that there is expertise across their workforce to ensure that the needs of children and young adults who are in contact with adults in treatment are identified and addressed.

The provider of the service will play a pivotal role in developing capacity and skills in both the local health and social system, and to partners who may be in contact with substance users or those affected by the substance use of others (including members of the community).

The provider will be expected to improve service uptake and the effectiveness of service users’ treatment journeys. To support the achievement of this the service will have a robust approach to engagement; they will promote the service with the local community and with other service providers.


Lots
This contract will not be split into lots as it is a single, integrated drug and alcohol service.

Interest is welcome from all experienced and capable service providers, including those who may or may not wish to work in consortia and/or utilise specified sub-contractors to deliver parts of the service.


TUPE [Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations]
Potential providers must be aware that TUPE may or may not apply to this service. Further details will be available in the invitation to tender.


Contract Period
The contract period will be for sixty (60) months from an estimated start date of 1 April 2018 with options to extend up to a further forty-eight (48) months in two (2) twenty-four (24) month periods.


Contract Value
The estimated total value of this contract is £44,100,000 over the maximum one hundred and eight (108) months term of the contract. This is based on £4,900,000 per annum.

There is a maximum fixed budget for this service. Any bids over this amount will be disqualified.


Award criteria
The contract will be awarded to the Most Economically Advantageous Tender (MEAT) in accordance with the Public Contracts Regulations. MEAT for this contract is quality 70% and cost 30%. Further details will be provided in the invitation to tender.

Cost 30%
Quality 70%

Quality made up of (as more particularly described in the ITT):
• Proposed approach to social value – 7%
• Proposed approach to clinical governance and quality – 21%
• Proposed approach to service model and outcomes – 21%
• Proposed approach to partnership working – 21% (this will include a presentation at 5%)

Presentation Question (5% of the 21% allocated above for partnership working):
Demonstrate how you will ensure that participation is systematic from the start of the contract and that shared decision making and collaboration (co-production) becomes the norm.

Following initial tender evaluation, only those bidders who meet the minimum requirements in “Part 4: Section 1: Method Statements” will be invited to give a presentation on partnership working (see above). The minimum requirements will be stated in the procurement documents (“ITT002 ITT Return” document).

The Council will allow seven (7) working days from the date of invitation to present for tenderers to prepare the presentation.

Bidders who are not invited for a presentation will also be notified via the portal. Detailed feedback will be provided to these bidders once the Council’s award process has concluded.

Total 100%

The Council reserves the right to hold meetings to clarify tenderers written submissions which may result in scores being adjusted.


Procurement Process
This procurement is being conducted in accordance with the Public Contracts Regulations 2015. The procurement is subject to the light-touch regime under Section 7 Social and Other Specific Services. Under Regulation 76 the Council is free to establish a procedure, provided that procedure is sufficient to ensure compliance with the principles of transparency and equal treatment of economic operators (service providers). It is anticipated the approach used will use a one stage tender with negotiation applying the award criteria specified in this contract notice.

All economic operators (service providers) who successfully express an interest will automatically be invited to tender and have access to the tender documents. Those who submit a tender and meet the minimum requirements will have their full tender, method statements and pricing evaluated and may be invited to negotiate (as required). The purpose of the negotiation is to qualitatively improve the bid. Economic operators (service providers) who do not meet the minimum requirements will not have their full tenders evaluated or be invited to negotiate.

The procurement process may be conducted in successive stages in order to reduce the number of tenders to be negotiated by applying the award criteria specified in the contract notice.

I) Request to participate with qualitative selection:
Initial evaluation of responses will include assessment of capacity, capability and minimum requirements to deliver the contract.

Only those organisations who meet the minimum requirements following the assessment of the information provided will have their initial tender evaluated.

Further details are in the invitation to tender documents.

II) Evaluation of initial tenders:
Organisations will be subject to the award criteria when invited to negotiation.

III) Negotiation:
The panel shall negotiate with tenderers the initial and all subsequent tenders submitted by them to improve their content, except for the final tender. The minimum requirements and award criteria shall not be subject to negotiation.

During negotiations the panel will ensure equal treatment of all tenderers and will:
• not provide information in a discriminatory manner which may give some tenderers an advantage over other;
• inform tenderers who have not been eliminated during the successive stages in writing, of any changes to the technical specification or any other tender documents;
• following any changes will give sufficient time to tenderers to modify and re-submit tenders, as appropriate

IV) Final call for tender:
No further negotiations will take place once final tenders have been received.

We reserve the right to award on the basis of initial tenders without negotiation where this offers value for money in the opinion of the Council.

We reserve the right to not award if it does not offer value for money.

Economic operators (service providers) will be required to have significant experience actively working within the delivery of drug and alcohol services in order to be considered. This tender is not suitable for entrants to the market who have never worked within the drug and alcohol field before. Economic operators (service providers) are advised to review the minimum requirements carefully before commencing any work on the remainder of the tender documents.

It is anticipated that there will be a limited market likely to be capable of fulfilling the need; therefore a one stage process is considered sufficient. Innovation and design will be required. Economic operators (service providers) will determine the precision in how this will be delivered as part of their tender responses.