1. Social Value in Procurement Eleni Pasdeki-Clewer
22nd November 2017

2. Meet the SDU
To embed and promote the three elements of sustainable development – environmental, social and financial
Purpose
National unit, working on behalf of the health and care system in England
Remit
Jointly funded by, and accountable to NHS England and Public Health England
Accountability

3. Terminology Triple bottom line: People, Planet, Profit Sustainability
Social Value
How do you interpret Social Value?

4. Terminology
People
Planet
Profit

5. ✗ ✓ The Social Value Act “The Public Services (Social Value) Act 2012”
Came into force on 31 January 2013
Commissioners required to consider the economic, environmental and social benefits of their approaches to procurement before the process starts.
They also have to consider whether they should consult on these issues.
Applies to:
Public authorities
Pre-procurement stage
Service contracts
Over OJEU thresholds
A tool to help get more value for money out of procurement
Does not apply to:
Goods contracts
Under OJEU
Call-offs
But it is good practice to do so!!! ✗ ✓

6. The Unit’s involvement
1 one the 8 modules that underpin the SDS
Implementation notes
Steering Group, Chaired by Sir Michael Marmot
East of England Informal Network
A steering group has been set up in partnership between the SDU (NHS England and PHE), Cabinet Office and Social Enterprise UK to help ensure the module and the SDS is implemented.  This is chaired by Michael Marmot and the steering group are collating case studies and best practice exemplars to show how use of the act can reduce inequalities across communities.  In particular they are recommending that system wide commissioning intentions are explicit about how they will reduce inequalities.

7. … in practice… Awareness Understanding Measurement
and take up of the Act is a mixed picture
For example:
Asking generic questions about “Social Value” – what does it mean? What element of Social Value are we interested to see promoted? Long term unemployed into work? Employment and training opportunities for certain disadvantaged groups? Ban the Box? Supporting local SMEs? Working with Social Enterprises?
Asking suppliers to explain how they are delivering the Social Value Act in their local communities and evaluating their responses
Asking suppliers of unrelated services to explain what benefits they will deliver to local communities and not scoring the question
Considering the impacts of a service and consulting with local communities but not acting upon the findings
Understanding
of how to apply it, varies → inconsistent practice: how to define SV, how and when to include it in the procurement process, applying SV within procurement rules & clarifying its use in pre-procurement
Measurement
is not yet fully developed
Lord Young’s review 2015

8. NHSE: work in progress Corestream Sustainability Risk Assessment
1.Business Need
2.ProcurementStrategy
3.Tender Process
4.Contract Award
5.Contract Management
Engage with and support Business Units
Consideration of Social Value within business case process
Sustainability Risk Assessment
Wide market engagement
Embed within specification and award criteria as appropriate
Supplier Code of Ethics tbd
Introduce into existing contracts when appropriate
Corestream

9. What I’m learning… Still exploring!
Term is unclear and interpreted in various ways which adds to the confusion
Most successful approaches suggest that it needs to make sense for local circumstances
Action needs to link with wider organisational objectives otherwise hard to assert links – need to set clear priorities
Cross-sectoral approaches would work best
Difficulty in quantification and paucity of measurement tools making it harder to demonstrate benefits
It’s about using public sector money to deliver much more than services
EoE Informal Network is proving helpful; scope and appetite for replication?

10. In summary… Invest in developing your approach and then: Be specific
Be relevant
Be decisive

11. Thank you!