Procurement for the provision of Sexual Assault Referral Centre Services for Thames Valley

NHS England (South Central) and Thames Valley Police are seeking to jointly re-commission Sexual Assault Referral Centre (SARC) services in Thames Valley. The commissioners seek tender responses from providers who have the capability and capacity to undertake such a contract.

This procurement is being carried out by NHS South, Central & West Commissioning Support Unit (SCW) on behalf of the Commissioners. The Commissioner will be contracting for the Services using the National NHS Standard Contract.

Contracts will be for an initial term of 3 years and are planned to commence from 1st April 2018. The value of the service will be £2,341,428 over three years.

At the discretion of the Commissioner, the contract may be extended for up to a further 24 months. NHS England (South Central) is responsible for Commissioning and ensuring the provision of accessible, effective and appropriate SARC (Sexual Assault Referral Centre) services for victims of sexual violence.

The Thames Valley SARC will deliver the following services through the SARC provision: • Acute healthcare and support • Comprehensive forensic medical examination • Follow up services, which address the client's medical, psychological and on-going needs • Direct access to referral to Independent Sexual Violence Advisors (ISVAs) • Co-ordinating the smooth running of the SARC services and liaising with partner organisations to ensure the profile of the service is maintained. SARC services should provide equitable access by individually tailored care packages based and comprehensive needs assessments, with a choice of action at every stage of clinical and non-clinical care and support, forensic examination and referral to appropriate services.

Thames Valley has a population of 2.34 million. The Police Force area covers the counties of Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire and is a mixture of sparsely populated rural areas and densely populated urban areas.

Further information in the additional text section. Additional information: Interested parties are invited to take part in an Invitation To Tender (ITT) process, based on the Open procedure, and designed to identify the Most Economically Advantageous Tender and therefore determine the incoming provider.

Interested providers will be able to view the tender opportunity via the 'current tenders' list on in-tend. https://in-tendhost.co.uk/scwcsu/aspx/Home Or you should be able to go directly to this particular tender opportunity by following the link below: https://in-tendhost.co.uk/scwcsu/aspx/ProjectManage/446 In order to access the tender documentation you will need to 'express an interest' and register on the system. A prior information/market engagement notice was published in relation to this procurement in May 2017, seeking expressions of interest.

Please note that this previous notice was an information gathering exercise rather than a call for competition in its own right. Although those who responded to that notice will be advised that this contract notice has been published, there will be no process exemptions or preferential treatment afforded to any parties who expressed an interest at that stage.

The Services are healthcare services within the meaning and scope of Annex XIV of Directive 2014/24/EU ("the Directive") and Schedule 3 to the Public Contract Regulations 2015 ("the Regulations"). The tendering process will be conducted in accordance with the requirements and flexibilities provided by Articles 74 to 76 of the Directive, and Regulations 74 to 76 of the Regulations.

The Authority will run a transparent tender process, treating all bidders equally. For the avoidance of doubt, the Authority will not be bound by the Regulations or the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union or any other regulations or legislation except for the specific parts or circumstances that apply to the procurement of these Services.

Neither the inclusion of a bidder selection stage, nor the use of any language or terms found in the Directive or Regulations, nor the description of the procedure voluntarily adopted by the Authority ("Open", "Restricted", "Competitive Procedure with Negotiation", "Competitive Dialogue" or any other description), nor any other indication, shall be taken to mean that the Authority intends to hold itself bound by the Directive or Regulations, save by the provisions applicable to services coming within the scope of Annex XIV of the Directive / Schedule 3 of the Regulations. The services are healthcare services falling within Schedule 3 to the Public Contracts Regulations 2015 ("the Regulations") which are not subject to the full regime of the Regulations, but is instead governed by the "Light Touch Regime" contained within Chapte