Official UK procurement notice
Best Start in Life: Perinatal Mental Health and Parent Infant Relationships Outreach Peer Support Groups
Authority: Kent County Council (Local council)
What is being bought
Published requirement descriptionMarket Engagement Notice
Best Start in Life: Perinatal Mental Health and Parent Infant Relationships Outreach Peer Support Groups
Authority: Kent County Council
Dates:
Note: final date will be selected depending on interest in the following options:
Wednesday 24th June 09.30-10.30am - Virtual session
Wednesday 1st July 09.00-10.00am - Virtual session
Registration Form:
Peer Support Groups: Pre-engagement event questions and registration – Fill out form
forms.office.com/e/XnGHgZzZVh ↗
Contact: [email protected]
Kent County Council is inviting organisations to provide insight into our ambition to design a Perinatal Mental Health and Parent Infant Relationship Outreach Peer Support group programme to deliver on the Best Start in Life – Healthy Babies three-year programme in Kent.
The peer support groups will be aimed at families/parents in the preconception phase, expecting a first or subsequent baby or with children aged 0-2 years who are at risk or affected by perinatal mental health/parent infant relationship concerns.
The aim is for peer support groups to run in:
•Thanet
•Swale
•Dartford
•Dover
•Gravesham
Peer support groups would be offered to:
•Black and Asian mothers
•Young parents including care leavers (aged 18 to 25 years)
•Expectant parents /parents of under twos living in specific areas of high need (tbc) within the districts listed above.
Indicative budget:
•April 2027 to March 2028 £250k
•April 2028 to March 2029 £250k
About the Best Start in Life - Healthy Babies Programme Link
The Best Start in Life Healthy Babies programme aims are:
•To provide support to parents and carers to help them nurture their babies and children and improving health and education outcomes for all
•To contribute to a reduction in inequalities in health and education outcomes for babies, children and families ensuring that support provided is communicated to all parents and carers, including those facing multiple disadvantage and those who are seldom heard
•To strengthen parent infant relationships and improve perinatal mental health
•To build the evidence base for what works when it comes to improving health and education outcomes for babies, children and families in different delivery contexts.
Market Engagement
We are looking to:
•gather market intelligence
•build early relationships with established and new markets
•develop a sustainable model which includes small voluntary sector, charities, not for profit organisations and small community interest groups
•understand suppliers’ interest, scope, and skills
•understand if and how the proposal could be feasible and deliverable within the financial envelope
•identify how the 3-year peer support programmes can be sustained and eventually owned by the community
This is an opportunity to share your ideas, highlight best practice and help shape the planning for perinatal mental health and parent infant relationship peer support outreach programme that meet this needs of the communities.
Interest is welcome from a range of organisations including VCSE organisations and community groups.
Those attending will also have an opportunity to provide their views via a questionnaire. KCC will analyse the findings from the questionnaire and the findings will inform model development.
Important information:
This engagement is just an early conversation to help shape our thinking. It isn’t a call for competition, and taking part won’t give any organisation an advantage. No commercial decisions have been made yet, and anything we share at this stage may change. If a procurement process is needed later, full details will be published in line with the procurement regulations.
CPV: Community health services
The lotProcurement structure
single lot · no lot value publishedPipeline intelligence · planning stage: how this market runs before the tender is published
How Kent County Council buys Social services (CPV 8532), and who usually turns up
Kent County Council’s published record next to the market for the same work. Frameworks and DPS are left out: they draw different bid counts. Whole-market view: Social services (CPV 8532) →
How the contest usually goes
Winner shares use published awards; bid and price charts use contested lots.
i
How often small and medium firms win.
Share of awards where the winner’s size is known.
The counts under this question show how many awards have a known supplier size.
Small firms have won here. Neither number says whether you qualify; it describes who has been winning.
i
How often local firms win similar work.
Winners with a registered address in the delivery region, out of awards with a known address.
Local means the winner is registered in the region where that award was delivered. The market figure counts awards delivered in South East England.
A local branch does not count if the registered address is elsewhere.
Most of this buyer’s recorded winners were registered in the region where that award was delivered.
i
How long buyers here take to decide after bids close.
Middle value in days from the bid deadline to the award date, on competitions that published both.
Only decided tenders count, so slow ones still waiting are not in.
Half of these awards have an award date within 37 days of the bid deadline.
i
How often work is awarded with no recorded rival.
Direct awards and tenders where every published lot count shows one bid.
Both shares are minimums: some awards have no bid count.
Thin markets produce this too; it is not proof of a tailored specification.
Direct awards or one recorded bid are common here. Check the route before spending time on a bid.
How many bids did past lots attract?
i
How many bids past lots received.
Each colour is a bid-count range. Only competed lots with a published count are included.
Past bids do not predict this tender.
1 bid21% / 19%
2–357% / 33%
4–67% / 33%
7+14% / 15%
How did awards compare with estimates?
i
Where winning prices landed against estimates.
Each colour shows awards below, close to or above the published estimate, one lot at a time.
Past prices are a guide, not a bid price.
Below estimate57% / 39%
Within ±2%43% / 61%
Above estimate0% / 0%
Assess each lot i
What past awards tell you about each lot.
See the forecast, this buyer’s earlier suppliers and firms with relevant wins.
No supplier is confirmed as a bidder.
i
What past awards tell you about each lot.
See the forecast, this buyer’s earlier suppliers and firms with relevant wins.
No supplier is confirmed as a bidder.
Open a lot for its forecast, this buyer’s previous supplier and possible competitors, from published award history, not a bid list
Lot #1CPV 8532Published estimate£500k
i
How many bids this lot may attract.
The forecast uses similar past competitions. The bar shows either that forecast or past bid counts; the line below says which.
Each lot shows its own forecast based on its own category; forecasts for different lots of the same notice are not comparative. The bar shows 27 past lots.
A forecast, not a list of bidders.
1 bid19%
2–333%
4–633%
7+15%
i
Where the award price may land.
The forecast uses similar awards and the buyer’s estimate. The band covers the middle half of likely prices.
No comparable awards for this lot yet.
A statistical guide from past awards, not a price to bid.
Who has supplied this buyer on similar work? i
Who has done similar work for this buyer.
Past contracts are matched by buyer, title and type of work.
A past supplier may not bid again.
i
Who has done similar work for this buyer.
Past contracts are matched by buyer, title and type of work.
A past supplier may not bid again.
No earlier contract of this buyer matches this lot on the published record.
Who could compete for this lot? i
Who could compete for this lot?
Firms with relevant past wins. On a framework, we show firms on that agreement.
None is confirmed as a bidder.
i
Who could compete for this lot?
Firms with relevant past wins. On a framework, we show firms on that agreement.
None is confirmed as a bidder.
Candidate suppliers for this notice have not been worked out yet, so this is not a verdict that nobody fits.
About this data
- Source. Official UK public procurement notices (Find a Tender), reused under the Open Government Licence v3.0. New notices arrive through the day; the figures are rebuilt nightly.
- Two views, kept apart. The authority’s own track record and the wider market for the same kind of work sit side by side and are never mixed. Where the local picture is too thin, a figure widens to a broader market and says which one it used.
- Forecasts are labelled. The price forecast and its range, possible competitors and the earlier-work matches are our estimates from past awards: not published facts, not win chances and not price advice. Official notices do not say who is bidding.
- Every figure shows what it rests on. Not every notice publishes a bid count, a value or a delivery region, so each figure carries the number of records behind it, and one built on few records is marked as such. The on a figure explains it; the counting rules are in the methodology. Spotted something wrong? Tell us.
Procedure terms & legal framework
From the official record- Legal basis
- UKPGA · 2023/54 Procurement Act 2023
- Procurement category
- Services
- Notice status
- Planned procurement
- Procurement threshold
- Above threshold (FTS publication)
- Regulatory regime
- Standard
- Commercial structure
- Stand-alone contract (no framework)
- Competition type
- Competitive procedure
- GPA / WTO covered
- Unspecified in notice
- Recurring procurement
- Unspecified in notice
- First published
- 16 Jun 2026, 15:47 BST
- Last source update
- 16 Jun 2026, 15:47 BST
- FTS notice number
2026/S 000-056762- Latest notice
- Preliminary market engagement notice (UK2)
- Classification (CPV)
- Delivery area
- Official registry OCID
ocds-h6vhtk-06b633Find a Tender
How it was run
Official notice- Submission deadline
- —
Timeline
16 Jun 2026 → 1 Apr 2027 · 3 dates- Planning notice published135 days ago16 Jun 2026, 15:47 BST
- Market engagement126 days ago24 Jun 2026, 23:59 BST
Kent County Council is inviting organisations to provide insight into our ambition to design a Perinatal Mental Health and Parent Infant Relationship Outreach Peer Support group programme to deliver on the Best Start in Life – Healthy Babies three-year programme in Kent.
We are looking to:
•gather market intelligence
•build early relationships with established and new markets
•develop a sustainable model which includes small voluntary sector, charities, not for profit organisations and small community interest groups
•understand suppliers’ interest, scope, and skills
•understand if and how the proposal could be feasible and deliverable within the financial envelope
•identify how the 3-year peer support programmes can be sustained and eventually owned by the community
This is an opportunity to share your ideas, highlight best practice and help shape the planning for perinatal mental health and parent infant relationship peer support outreach programme that meet this needs of the communities.
Interest is welcome from a range of organisations including VCSE organisations and community groups.
Those attending will also have an opportunity to provide their views via a questionnaire. KCC will analyse the findings from the questionnaire and the findings will inform model development.
Important information:
This engagement is just an early conversation to help shape our thinking. It isn’t a call for competition, and taking part won’t give any organisation an advantage. No commercial decisions have been made yet, and anything we share at this stage may change. If a procurement process is needed later, full details will be published in line with the procurement regulations.
- Today29 Oct 2026
- Contract startsin 153 days1 Apr 2027, 00:00 BST
Notice history
1 event · 1 release on Find a Tender- Preliminary market engagement notice published16 Jun 2026, 15:47 BSTUK2
Commercial outcome & contract awards
Pipeline notice- Awards (0)
- No award published
- Contracts (0)
- No contract published
- Bid statistics
- No aggregate bid statistics published
Contracting authority & participating public bodies
Official documents & specifications (1)
Official links; attachments are not copiedNotices published for this procedure
- Preliminary market engagement notice Preliminary market engagement notice on Find a Tender