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Official procurement procedure
Pilot for Identifying Unmet Needs Between Local Authorities and Probation Services
No classification published
Location not published
Published value
Not published
Submission deadline Not published
Lots published1
Procurement Executive Summary
AI & Search Synopsis
Generated from official OCDS record
Tenderline Synopsis: Ministry of Justice: "Pilot for Identifying Unmet Needs Between Local Authorities and Probation Services". Published status: complete. Published value: Value not published. 1 published lot. Submission deadline not published. See the official notice for participation instructions.
| Contracting Authority | Ministry of Justice | Scope & Categories | Not published | Submission Window | complete No deadline published |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Submission Gateway | Direct notice route | Legal Basis & Regime | Standard procurement | Estimated Value (exc. VAT) | Not published |
Bidder Intelligence · Authority Profile: Ministry of Justice
Market Analytics
Derived from OCDS awards & bid statistics
Published history for Ministry of Justice. These figures describe retained records, not a forecast of bids or a measure of buyer bias.
Published-to-award variance
Not availableInsufficient comparable data
Competition Density
5Bids / Report
Supplier ConcentrationHigh Concentration
Solirius Reply LtdTop vendor: 53.1% of attributable valuePayment Terms
Check noticePublished terms
Coverage: 225 active published awards; 4 bid reports (which may be per lot). Supplier values exclude multi-supplier awards, frameworks and DPS, and use GBP only. They are published award values, not payments. Published-to-award variance compares single-lot, single-award, single-supplier GBP procedures with explicitly non-framework/non-DPS status; increases remain in the average. Unpublished data stays unknown. Awarded suppliers are winners, not all bidders.
Historical Awarded Suppliers With This Authority:
| Supplier Name | Historic Awards | Attributable GBP Value |
|---|---|---|
| Solirius Reply Ltd | 1 win | £250,000 |
| Girbau UK | 1 win | £221,250 |
Procedure terms
Contracting AuthorityMinistry of Justice | Procedure methodNot published | Procurement categoryNot published |
Statuscomplete | Framework / DPSNot published | CompetitionNot published |
Above thresholdNot published | Legal basisNot published | Tender period startsNot published |
Clarification deadlineNot published | Electronic submissionNot published | Submission languagesNot published |
Published16 Feb 2026, 14:30 GMT | Last source update16 Feb 2026, 14:30 GMT | Recurring procurementNot published |
ClassificationNot published | ||
Delivery areaLocation not published | ||
OCIDocds-h6vhtk-05fe36 | ||
What is being bought
The Secretary of State for Justice (“MOJ”) has a strategic objective to reduce reoffending and improve public protection by enabling more effective, data-informed decision-making within probation services. HMPPS have expressed the need for a pilot in which a supplier will test the hypothesis that access to Local Authority data will add capacity into the probation system and enable frontline staff to perform their feasibility of surfacing cross-system data to probation officers and commissioners. The insights generated will support risk and needs assessments, sentence planning, and commissioning decisions.
The Ministry of Justice intends to award a contract to Newton Consulting Limited (the “Supplier”) for 6 months (plus optional 3 month extension) at a maximum contract value of £800,000 to test whether: (a) Local Authorities (“LA”) hold data on unmet need that can drive effectiveness in sentence management for use by probation practitioners; and (b) HMPPS can serve that data to probation services.
The supplier is required to design and deliver a pilot that enables probation services to access cross-system data such as mental health, housing, education, and substance misuse indicators; to identify unmet needs among people on probation. The pilot will involve 5–10 local authorities or equivalent data holders and their corresponding Probation Delivery Units (PDUs).
What changed
From the official release history
- Official notice release published
16 Feb 2026, 14:30 GMT - Official notice release published
21 Jan 2026, 11:33 GMT - Status changed to complete
30 Dec 2025, 14:02 GMT - Official notice release published
30 Dec 2025, 14:02 GMT - Buyer information updated
30 Dec 2025, 14:02 GMT
Lots and requirements (1)
Published by the contracting authority
- Lot 1 · #1Individual lot title not publishedcompletePublished valueNot publishedThe source published no individual title or description for this lot.Contract periodNot publishedEligibilityNot publishedOptions / renewalNot published
Timeline
- Procedure published
16 Feb 2026, 14:30 GMT - Award active
Not published · Not published - Contract active
Signed 5 Feb 2026, 00:00 GMT · £795,000
Commercial outcome and competition
Awards NEWTON CONSULTING LIMITED Not published · Not published · active |
Contracts Pilot fot Identifying Unmet Needs between Probation Services, Local Authorities and the Criminal Justice System £795,000 · signed 5 Feb 2026, 00:00 GMT · active Contract period: 5 Feb 2026, 00:00 GMT — 4 Aug 2026, 23:59 BST |
Bid statisticsNo aggregate bid statistics published |
Buyer and organisations in this procedure
Ministry of Justice
Contracting authority GB-PPON-PDNN-2773-HVYNDocuments (1)
Official links; attachments are not copied
Related procedures (0)
No related procedures published
Planning and rationale
Planning budgetNot published |
No-engagement rationaleNot published |
Procedure rationaleThe Ministry of Justice has a strategic objective to reduce reoffending and improve public protection by enabling more effective, data-informed decision-making within probation services. At present, probation officers continue to rely on incomplete or delayed information, which undermines their ability to assess risk, plan interventions, and commission services effectively.
HMPPS have expressed the need for a pilot in which a supplier will test the hypothesis that sharing data between HMPPS and Local Authorities will add capacity into the probation system and enable frontline staff to perform their feasibility of surfacing cross-system data to probation officers and commissioners. The insights generated will support risk and needs assessments, sentence planning, and commissioning decisions.
This contract is for researching the data held by Local Authorities and HMPPS which could be shared between both parties to assess whether such data would be useful to share and to understand the viability of procuring a solution to share data between HMPPS and Local Authorities. This contract will deliver a prototype to understand the feasibility for a data solution.
The contracting authority ("MOJ") is relying on the prototypes and development direct award justifications in set out in Procurement Act 2023, Schedule 5, clause 2 for Direct Award:
• The public contract concerns the production of a prototype, or supply of other novel goods or services, for the purpose of—
(a)testing the suitability of the goods or services,
(b)researching the viability of producing or supplying the goods or services at scale and developing them for that purpose, or
(c)other research, experiment, study or development.
This is further backed up by guidance set out in paragraphs 15 and 16 of Schedule 5 in the Procurement Act 23 Direct Award guidance regarding Prototypes and Development:
15) This justification allows for direct award when procuring a prototype or other novel good or service that is designed or developed at the request of the contracting authority. For example, procuring a solution to enable data to be shared securely between different agencies.
16) The public contract must be limited to the early stages of design and development and aimed only at testing the suitability of the goods or services, understanding the viability of production or supply in quantity or other research, experiment, study or development. This means it must not include quantity production or supply beyond that necessary for these purposes, for example, to produce or supply the contracting authority with the goods or service on a commercial basis.
The explanations for why the justifications apply are as follows.
This discovery pilot needs to be done at pace, to fit with longer term strategic digital development as an enabler for the Our Future Probation Service, which is tasked with liberating 25% of probation practitioner time. To delay will miss the opportunity to build on the work completed for Kent County Council (“KCC”) and would require a greater financial commitment if HMPPS were to attempt to commission this work from scratch.
This justification applies because the pilot contract is for researching and developing a prototype to share the data held by Local Authorities and HMPPS to assess whether such data would be useful to share between the parties and to understand the viability of procuring such a. This is very similar to the example set out in paragraph 15 of the guidance. This contract is to understand viability and configure a prototype so is similar the circumstances set out in paragraph 16 of the guidance.
Newton Consulting Ltd. have been identified as the most appropriate supplier on the basis they have an existing delivery model and relationships with the HMPPS and Kent County Council (KCC). This builds on the work already undertaken by the supplier with KCC, and involving HMPPS at a Probation Delivery Unit (PDU) level, but to pivot this to offer HMPPS a national view on how data sharing with Local Authorities could work across England and Wales, supported by draft designs and recommendations based on small-scale user testing with probation practitioners in the Kent, Surrey & Sussex Probation region. |