RFP QuestBeta
Awarded · ResultStage · contract

West of England Combined Authority

Mayoral Priority Skills Fund (MPSF) Phase One Evaluation

Business ServicesCPV 79000000 79400000 79410000
Value£67k
Awarded20 Dec 2024
Published23 Jan 2025
RegionSouth West
Outcome — awarded

This is a contract result notice, not an open opportunity. Details from the official award data.

Contract value in context
£67ktotal contract value
median £66k
this tender£0£1.6m

This sits in the upper-middle of the Business Services band — a substantial contract for the sector. Based on 57,319 valued Business Services tenders in our corpus.

The brief

The Mayoral Priority Skills Fund (MPSF) was created to provide flexible grant funding to meet current priority skills gaps in the region.

Priorities have been identified through robust intelligence gathered through delivery of previous and existing programmes, data, reports, and gaps identified through our other services, such as Skills Connect.

The aim was to have a Fund that was flexible enough to respond to identified gaps where there are no other means of funding, or to bridge gaps in funding which may otherwise lead to gaps in vital skills provision.

It also aimed to enable innovation and the ability to test interventions where there are gaps.

This first round of MPSF funding (known as 'phase one') consisted of £2,580,665 from the Mayoral Combined Authority Investment Fund and £3,200,000 from the UK Shared Prosperity Fund (UKSPF), providing almost £5.8 million to address gaps in provision for the region.

Phase one of MPSF commenced in July 2023 and is due to come to an end in December 2025.

There are 16 projects funded under phase one.

15 projects were funded until March 2025 (known as 'call one') under several themes (see below).

A few of these projects will continue to be funded until September 2025 using some underspend (known as 'continuation funding for call one projects').

A 16th project, Union Learn West, is due to start delivery imminently and will run until December 2025.

Individual projects have received between £50,175 - £1,413,000.

The West of England Mayoral Combined Authority are now looking to procurement a final evaluation of phase one that looks at both the impact that phase one has had on the region, and what we can learn from the implementation and delivery models of phase one that could be fed into the implementation of phase two.

The successful tenderer will deliver a final process, impact, and value for money evaluation of phase one of the MPSF to answer the research questions set out below.

The evaluation will ensure useful learning is provided for the MCA but also that we well prepared to submit evidence of impact to the Government as part of future Gateway Review processes.

Requirements

What the notice asks for

01

The Mayoral Priority Skills Fund (MPSF) was

The Mayoral Priority Skills Fund (MPSF) was created to provide flexible grant funding to meet current priority skills gaps in the region.

02

The successful tenderer will deliver a final

The successful tenderer will deliver a final process, impact, and value for money evaluation of phase one of the MPSF to answer the research questions set out below.

03

The evaluation will ensure useful learning is

The evaluation will ensure useful learning is provided for the MCA but also that we well prepared to submit evidence of impact to the Government as part of future Gateway Review processes.

Sentences from the notice that state an obligation, surfaced automatically and shown in the order they appear. Not an exhaustive list — always confirm against the tender documents.

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Source & provenance
OCID
bf778b53-c675-4ee4-9636-27f9bae4c97b
Stage
contract · Contract
Source
Contracts Finder
Buyer ref
CF-0005000DWS000000ED3p2AG
View the original notice on Contracts Finder

Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Source data © Crown copyright.

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