The Cabinet Procurement and Insourcing Committee has decided to award a contract for professional consultancy services to support the Council's capital programme.

URL: https://hackney.moderngov.co.uk/ieDecisionDetails.aspx?ID=8426

Decision Maker: Cabinet Procurement and Insourcing Committee

Outcome:

Is Key Decision?: Yes

Is Callable In?: No

Purpose: The report seeks approval of the award of contract for CPAM Framework of Construction Contractors

Content: The report seeks approval of the award of contract for CPAM Framework of Construction Contractors RESOLVED to :   1  Approves the award of? the Asset Management Delivery Professional Consultancy Services Framework Agreement to support the delivery of the Council’s Asset Management Delivery Capital programme ?to the following bidders:?-   Lot 1 - Architectural and Engineering Services - Bidders A, B, C, D   Lot 2 - Multidisciplinary Consultants - Bidders M, N, O, P   Lot 3 - Building Consultants - Bidders S, U, M, N   Reasons For Decision   The Council has a Capital and Revenue programme of works requiring significant investment to support key Council priorities across a wide variety of its property assets which is managed under its various Directorates. The Council needs to therefore procure various professional Consultants to provide extensive technical expertise and support in its delivery of the Capital Programme of works.   The professional services required to support such capital projects include Architecture and Design, Employer’s Agent, Cost Control, various types of Surveying, Structural Engineering, Mechanical and Electrical Engineering, Quantity Surveying, and Party Wall Surveyors. The multi-disciplinary consultants provide a range of professional and technical services required by the Council to effectively support the delivery of its capital programme. These services are not available in-house presently and have not been historically.   The Council therefore proposed to set up an AMD framework agreement with pre-vetted, high-quality technical professional consultants offering competitive rates to assist it in delivering capital projects over the next four years.   This report seeks approval for the award of a contract for professional consultant services to support the Council’s capital programme.    The aim is to establish a 4 year Consultants Framework, which will consist of small and medium-sized enterprises (SME) types of professionals/organisations that can be regularly used by the AMD department. Although there are many Nationwide Consultancy Frameworks, they very rarely have small suppliers on their lists. Officers’ experience in using such frameworks has shown that larger organisations do not always fit the profile for services to be carried out quickly.   The formation of a professional consultancy framework offers the Council a rapid, easily accessible, highly cost effective route to appointing vetted professional service providers. It will help the Council to achieve better quality of the service and save money.   The spend on consultancy services to assist the Council in delivering the capital works programme over the next four years is estimated to be in the region of £10.5m. This will be mainly for CIPFA condition surveys related to high priority remedial and compliance related works including standalone projects.   Estimated value - The total value of Works for Contractors’ Works to support the capital programme projects over the next 4 years (2025-29) is estimated to be £80m of which approximately up to £10.5m is estimated to be spent on Consultants’ fees for professional services to support the Council’s capital investment programme for the duration of this strategy. The professional fees are currently based on 13% of the indicative value of Works value of £80m.   The fees for consultant services to support the delivery of capital projects are funded through the Council’s approved capital programme budget.   Alternative Options Considered and Rejected   Option 1: Insource all or part of the professional services required Resources required for specialised  skills and expertise such as Quantity Surveyors, Cost Control Consultants, Structural Engineers, Architects, Employers Agents are not available in-house nor generally employed directly by the Council as these services are required on an adhoc basis on Capital projects depending on the nature of the works being carried out. These expertise are required to compile technical specifications and support the large programme of Capital works. The lack of suitably qualified and competent, in the professional discipline, staff and operational accommodation associated with insourcing all the professional consultancies’ activities included in the AMD contracts does not make this option viable and was therefore rejected.   Option 2 – Utilising existing consultant services frameworks This is not the preferred route in order to meet the requirements. AMD Capital projects often require specialist expertise with very narrow timeframes and therefore Officers need the consultants whose values and a way of working are aligned with Council’s. At present this model is not effectively working to the needs and nature of the works being delivered.  Currently, too much Officer time is being spent on seeking quotations from various professional consultancies. The AMD department, and indeed the Council, would like to offer more support to small businesses and by procuring this consultancy framework, Officers can extend the pool of suppliers by inviting small and medium local companies that are not on the existing frameworks, to participate.   Option 3 - To procure consultancy services via conventional tender routes These routes are time consuming and require more resources from the AMD department. The nature of the department’s work is often urgent and requires using the most efficient way to procure services. The use of one off procurement exercises would lead to a wide variety of consultants making contract management more complex.  It would also give rise to a wide variety of prices for similar work, due to different tendering times.  This offers poor cost certainty and may cause challenges from clients.  One-off procurement exercises will only be used for unusual items and bespoke specialist works which fall outside of the longer term contractual arrangements.

Date of Decision: July 7, 2025