Due to commercially sensitive information contained within the report, this item will now be considered in Part 2 of the agenda.

(Councillor Fawthrop left the meeting during consideration of this item)

In reviewing the contents of the report, a Member noted that it had been significantly redacted, did not contain any commercially sensitive information and therefore did not justify consideration in Part 2 of the agenda.  It was consequently moved by Cllr Wilkins, seconded by the Chairman, and carried that the report be considered in public (Part 1).

In April 2013, the shared parking service between LB Bromley and LB Bexley for which it was agreed that LB Bromley would be the host borough formally came into being. The formal Collaboration Agreement between the two boroughs was approved in February 2013. The principal objectives of the shared service were to develop best service practice and to realise a saving in management costs and other overheads without detriment to the delivery of the front-line service.

A key element of the business case for establishing the shared parking service was the opportunity to realise further savings and efficiencies by bringing the boroughs together in a single shared parking contract when their existing contracts expired. Harmonisation of the boroughs’ approaches to parking enforcement was already underway when the joint procurement of a single shared service contract commenced.

Bromley’s current contract with Vinci Park Services (now known as Indigo) commenced in October 2006 and was due to end in September 2016. The contract included provision of the following services:

·  Patrolling and enforcing on-street parking restrictions through the issue of PCNs.

·  Patrolling and enforcing all council-owned car parks through the issue of PCNs.

·  Car park management and maintenance.

·  Equipment maintenance and management.

·  Collecting cash from pay and display machines, and pay stations in multi-storey car parks.

·  School crossing patrols, funded by TfL and individual schools.

Bexley’s current contract with NSL commenced in April 2010 and was due to end in April 2017, following agreement to align the contract end date with LB Bromley. The contract included the following services:

·  Patrolling and enforcing on-street parking restrictions through the issue of PCNs.

·  Patrolling and enforcing car parks through the issue of PCNs.

·  CCTV mobile units.

In March 2015, Bromley Council’s Executive agreed the scope of the procurement and indicative timetables. Officers worked on and developed a Contract and Specifications with associated KPIs which was fit for purpose and meet the requirements of Parking Services and the Council over the next 10 years.  A contract extension report was approved by the Portfolio Holder in July 2016 to ensure continuity of service through to 2 April 2017.  The tender specification and process was drafted in such a way as to obtain quotes from companies for the provision of service to either one authority or both authorities for a period of 5 years with a possible extension of 5 years or a period of a straight 10 years.  The shared service led on this joint procurement exercise. A management board was created comprising of officers at senior officer and operational level who worked closely together over a two year period to establish a specification which was fit for individual authorities or as a joint solution.

The Board provided close scrutiny and governance of the process and insured that all procurement and legal requirements were fully adhered to and monitoring procedures established as part of the contract to insure the highest standards were achieved and maintained by the successful contractor. The shared service would continue to monitor the performance of contractors as it had since the commencement of the service in April 2013.

The Assistant Director for Leisure and Culture provided the Sub-committee with the background to the item and reported that Officers were on track to deliver the outcome of the tendering exercise for consideration by the Executive in November 2016 as previously advised.  The evaluation and scoring of the tender documents that had been received would be completed by Friday 4 November 2016 with final evaluation completed by Tuesday 8 November 2016.  A two part report (Part 1 in public and Part 2 containing commercially sensitive information) would be put forward to the reporting PDS Committees during November and the Executive on 30 November 2016.  The paper that had been circulated to the Contracts Sub-Committee was a very rough first draft of the report as officer time had been dedicated to tender evaluation rather than writing the report.

The Assistant Director for Leisure and Culture explained that a range of expertise, especially procurement and commissioning processes and practices, had been drawn upon during the qualitative evaluation process.  The Chairman was pleased to hear this as it demonstrated that lessons had been learnt from earlier issues that had arisen in contractual processes.  The Director of Commissioning stressed the importance of collaborative working between the commercial group, the commissioning group, and the service group.  This type of collaborative working had been undertaken for the tendering process for the new parking contract and it was clear that this positive approach to collaborative working had delivered improvements within the tender process.  Members stressed that this positive approach to collaborative working needed to be replicated and emulated across all service areas in order to ensure that the correct contractual processes and procedures were followed.

A Member queried how the lessons learnt from audit processes surrounding the existing parking contract had been incorporated into the new contract.  The Assistant Director provided assurances that the contract specification set out the Council’s expectations on any new provider in terms of the processes they would be expected to undertake to ensure that any staff working for the London Borough of Bromley were eligible to work in the United Kingdom.  The Head of Parking reported that he had personally seen the eligibility checks now being undertaken on new staff in terms of checking passports and work permits.  The Head of Parking confirmed that he was confident that robust checks and balances were now in place.  In terms of issues with hand-held units, all such units were password protected with passwords being checked and changed on a regular basis.  Civil Enforcement Officers also wore body cameras that were regularly monitored.  Managers were confident that hand-held devises were being used by the staff to whom they had been issued.

A Member queried the length of the new contract stressing that 10 years appeared to be a long time for a contract.  In response, the Director of Commissioning explained that a more competitive price could be obtained for a 10 year contract as there was less risk to the company who were more likely to recoup costs over a longer period of time.  A longer term contract would need to be considered in order to increase value for money.  Once tenders had been received and evaluated, any additional risks of a longer term contract would need to be weighed against any reduction in cost to identify whether the risks were worth the reduced costs to the Council.  The Assistant Director of Leisure and Culture confirmed that in order to extend the life of the contract innovation had been built into the specification.  One such innovation being explored was a more to more cashless collection as this carried fewer risks to the Council.

RESOLVED: That the update be noted.