D2N2 Children in Care Framework

Tender description

Nottinghamshire County Council have, on behalf of Derbyshire County Council, Derby City Council, Nottingham City and Nottinghamshire County Council, (hence forth referred to as D2N2), completed the first phase to establish a hybrid Framework to provide independent Fostering and Residential Homes Placements provision, including where required out of D2N2 boundary placements. Services that will be purchased under the Framework by D2N2 will include individualised packages to meet the needs of the children and young people, and include Emergency, Planned, Short term, Long term, Permanent, Sibling, Solo, Respite, Parent and baby, and Remand Placements. The Framework will remain open for new tenders for the duration of its operation. These bids will be evaluated at set intervals, which will enable the D2N2 group to take advantage of emerging capacity whenever it is available and this should minimise the use of Spot contracting. Bidders are able to tender for one or more of the following Lots; Lot 1: Independent Residential Children’s Homes, that includes, Standard Children’s and Specialist Homes, Lot 2: Independent Fostering Agency Services, that includes, Standard Provision and Specialist Provision. In order to address some of the shortcomings of previous frameworks, Providers were asked to self-select if they are prepared to accept referrals for; i. Emergency Placements ii. Provision within the D2N2 foot print iii. Outside the D2N2 area This enables referrals to be limited to only those Providers by specific Lots and their own preference. The list of preferences will be refined over the life of the Framework. The Framework has also been designed to enable the D2N2 group the ability to conduct other further competition processes , that could include Block arrangements, either collaboratively or as individual Authorities The Framework has been established with an initial duration of four-years, with an option to extend for a further two one-year extensions, to a maximum of six years.