NOMS Co-Financing Organisation (CFO) provision for the European Social Fund (ESF) 2014-2020 Operational Programme (Round 3) - Lot 8 North East

The focus of NOMS CFO is to help offenders move towards mainstream provision or into employment by addressing their barriers to work through facilitating access to comprehensive support mechanisms appropriate to their individual circumstance and assessed need.

The Authority is awarding contracts to providers to assist with providing these comprehensive support mechanisms in each of the 9 ESF Contract Areas (“ECAs”) identified below.

This may entail provision of educational, training, vocational, counselling and rehabilitation services.

These services will be provided to eligible offenders who are in custody or in the community (known as “participants”).

There will be an emphasis on providing these services to those participants furthest away from mainstream activity, with an additional focus on a number of specific hard-to-reach groups within each of the nine ECAs.

These services will be delivered on a case management basis, developing a programme for each participant.

It is expected that in up to 70% of cases these services will first be provided to participants when they are in custody.

However, as participant’s progress through the case management programme it is expected that the split will become 50:50 between custody and community.

If additional funding is received after the publication of this contract award notice then the total value of the lots may increase above GBP 115,280,000.

The value of any potential additional funding is currently unknown but could be in the region of up to GBP 115,280,000.

The Authority reserves the right to adjust the contract values in the event that additional funding is obtained whether at, above or below the potential additional funding level indicated above.

If additional funding is obtained it is expected that the Authority will distribute this money among the nine lots on a pro rata basis.

In addition, the contract for each ECA will include an extension option which may be exercised at the Authority's discretion.

The total period for the extension could be a maximum of two years.

The extension period will most likely be divided into two 1 year extensions.

The contract for each lot will also include a break clause which may be exercised by the Authority as of 31December 2017.

The Authority will determine whether to exercise the break clause on a contract by contract basis.

For the purposes of this award, each ECA represents a lot.

The nine lots and their values are given below: Lot 1 North West GBP 18 358 652; Lot 2 South East GBP 16 267 309; Lot 3 Yorkshire & Humberside GBP 13 722 646; Lot 4 West Midlands GBP 13 591 200; Lot 5 East Midlands GBP 13 444 587; Lot 6 London GBP 11 656 581; Lot 7 East of England GBP 11 225 168; Lot 8 North East GBP 8 535 577; and Lot 9 South West (excluding Cornwall) GBP 8 478 280.