Official UK procurement notice
Suffolk Alternative Provision Tier One (Outreach) Service
Authority: Suffolk County Council (Local council)
What is being bought
Published requirement descriptionSuffolk County Council (SCC) are currently out to tender for an Alternative Provision Tier One (Outreach) Service.
This involves delivering targeted early support within mainstream schools, supporting children across all Key Stages 1 - 4, to address emerging needs promptly. The goal is to provide assistance before challenges escalate for children, reducing the likelihood of exclusion, maximising engagement and participation in learning and promoting inclusion with the mainstream educational environment.
Timely outreach support and robust intervention with Children and Young People (CYP) to ensure they can succeed and remain in mainstream education will raise education attainment and skill levels.
This is important as these CYP are often our most vulnerable in our communities and failure to secure a good quality educational offer can often lead to a reliance upon other services such as social care or mental health providers.
The CYP who will be referred, and who will access the Tier 1 Outreach support, will have complex needs that will require the provider to tailor their approach to the individual needs of the young person. This will involve working in partnership with other agencies, schools and stakeholders as well as parents/carers and the young people themselves to ensure best outcomes.
The primary objective of Tier 1 AP is to provide specific support around barriers to learning and enable pupils to remain in their referring school.
The Special Educational Needs/Alternative Provision Service Development Team has a core focus on commissioning high quality educational provision for vulnerable and disadvantaged learners as well as ensuring that this cohort of pupils can make progress based on age, ability and prior achievement through easy access to a robust 'Local Offer' as set out in the SEND reforms (Special Education Needs and Disability Code of Practice: 0 to 25 years).
Historically there has been a significant increase in the number of young people permanently excluded across all Key Stages. Suffolk County Council has a continued commitment to provide the right intervention at the right time. As such, this Tier 1 AP Outreach programme can have a key impact to avoid exclusion.
- The authority expects to re-tender this requirement around 11 Mar 2028, 23:59 GMT.
CPV: Education and training services · Health and social work services
The lotProcurement structure
single lot · value publishedLot #1CancelledRenewalPublished value£1,600,000
- Economic & financial standing
Financial capacity
- Confirmation that the Tenderer has, or can commit to obtain, prior to the award of the contract, the levels of insurance cover indicated in the Procurement Specific Questionnaire, and that the cost of insurances has been included in the costs/prices submitted within the Tender submission.
- Technical & professional ability
UK General Data Protection Regulations
- Tenderer does not pose a Data Protection risk to the Council (that cannot be mitigated).
Experience of sub-contractor management
- Tenderer provides evidence demonstrating how they have previously maintained healthy supply chains with their sub-contractor(s) (if applicable).
Health and safety
- Tenderer provides their H&S Policy Statement together with an explanation of their H&S arrangements (which should follow a recognised H&S Management system).
Ofsted Registration and Rating
- Tenderer confirms they are registered with Ofsted and currently graded at least 'Good', or meeting the 'Expected' standard across all areas of the new Ofsted Inspection Framework (November 2025).
What it takes to wini
How this buyer will score bids.
The evaluation criteria and weights exactly as published on the notice, grouped by family (price, quality, social value and so on).
Evaluation split and conditions of participation as published; the tender pack may add morei
How this buyer will score bids.
The evaluation criteria and weights exactly as published on the notice, grouped by family (price, quality, social value and so on).
Published sub-criteria (6)
- Safeguarding: 15%
- Delivery and Methodology: 15%
- Approach, Strategic Oversight and Outcomes: 15%
- Staffing: 15%
- Price: 30%
- Social Value: 10%
Published award criteria (6)
- Price: As described in the tender documentation.
- Safeguarding: As described in the tender documentation.
- Delivery and Methodology: As described in the tender documentation.
- Approach, Strategic Oversight and Outcomes: As described in the tender documentation.
- Staffing: As described in the tender documentation.
- Social Value: As described in the tender documentation.
- Economic & financial standing
Financial capacity
- Confirmation that the Tenderer has, or can commit to obtain, prior to the award of the contract, the levels of insurance cover indicated in the Procurement Specific Questionnaire, and that the cost of insurances has been included in the costs/prices submitted within the Tender submission.
- Technical & professional ability
UK General Data Protection Regulations
- Tenderer does not pose a Data Protection risk to the Council (that cannot be mitigated).
Experience of sub-contractor management
- Tenderer provides evidence demonstrating how they have previously maintained healthy supply chains with their sub-contractor(s) (if applicable).
Health and safety
- Tenderer provides their H&S Policy Statement together with an explanation of their H&S arrangements (which should follow a recognised H&S Management system).
Ofsted Registration and Rating
- Tenderer confirms they are registered with Ofsted and currently graded at least 'Good', or meeting the 'Expected' standard across all areas of the new Ofsted Inspection Framework (November 2025).
- Price carries 30 of 100 points: a 10% discount moves about 3 points. The method statement decides this lot, not the discount.
Price arithmetic assumes straight proportional scoring; the tender pack may use another formula.
Procedure terms & legal framework
From the official record- Procedure method
- Open procedure
- Legal basis
- UKPGA · 2023/54 Procurement Act 2023
- Procurement category
- Services
- Notice status
- Cancelled
- Procurement threshold
- Above threshold (FTS publication)
- Regulatory regime
- Light touch regime
- Commercial structure
- Stand-alone contract (no framework)
- Competition type
- Competitive procedure
- GPA / WTO covered
- Yes (GPA)
- Recurring procurement
- Yes · next expected 11 Mar 2028
- First published
- 26 Nov 2025, 17:17 GMT
- Last source update
- 1 Apr 2026, 14:46 BST
- Award evaluation window
- Submission end – 15 Jun 2026
- Authority reference
PA0035- FTS notice number
2026/S 000-022023- Latest notice
- Procurement termination notice (UK12)
- Classification (CPV)
- Delivery area
- Official registry OCID
ocds-h6vhtk-05e9aaFind a Tender
- Risks
Suffolk County Council has joined the government's Devolution Priority Programme (DPP), a fast-track programme towards devolution and local government reorganisation.
Under the DPP it is proposed that:
a) a Mayoral Combined County Authority (MCCA) for Norfolk and Suffolk is established, with strategic powers and headed by an elected mayor ("Devolution").
b) the existing two-tier council structure in Suffolk is abolished and replaced with one or more unitary councils covering the current geographical boundary of Suffolk ("LGR").
It is possible that both, one or neither of these changes will happen. These changes are declared as known risks as we do not yet know the implications of Devolution and/or LGR.
As a result of LGR and Devolution, contract modifications may be necessary to novate, transfer or disaggregate the contract from the one you entered into to one or more successor authorities or the MCAA. Impacts could include changes to geographical boundaries, significant increases and/or decreases in the goods and/or services required due to the change in size/scope of any successor authority or the MCAA. This may also change the scope of the contract
Interested Parties should refer to the Invitation to Tender and Contract Terms for the Known Risks:
Contract novation, transfer or disaggregation to one or more Successor Authorities or the MCAA within the current geographical boundary of Suffolk.
Contract novation, transfer or disaggregation to one or more Successor Authorities or the MCAA outside the current geographical boundary of Suffolk.
How it was run
Official notice- Submission deadline
- 13 Apr 2026, 11:00 BST
- Clarification deadline
- 27 Mar 2026, 23:59 GMT
- Submission channel
- Official e-sourcing portal
- Electronic submission
- Allowed
- Accepted languages
- en
Timeline
26 Nov 2025 → 1 Sept 2026 · 9 dates- Planning notice published335 days ago26 Nov 2025, 17:17 GMT
- Market engagement300 days ago31 Dec 2025, 23:59 GMT
Across SCC, we have been carefully considering our AP Strategy and how we further support children in Suffolk in line with the 3 Tiers of AP as defined by the DfE here:
www.gov.uk/government/publicati… ↗
With this in mind, we are hosting a market engagement event on MS Teams from 10am - 11am on Tuesday 9th December 2025. If you would like to attend and support the next steps in Alternative Provision for Suffolk's CYP, please email [email protected] to confirm your interest.
Please note, it is envisaged that prospective bidders will need to be an Ofsted registered educational setting in order to be eligible for this contract. This, and any other Conditions of Participation, will be clearly set out in the tender documents and in the tender notice should we go ahead with the procurement.
Interested parties are also invited to complete the following questionnaire (ideally by 12 noon on Friday 5th December):
forms.office.com/Pages/ResponsePage.aspx ↗
We are aiming for a Tier 1 Outreach offer to be able to support children across mainstream schools from 1 September 2026, with a contract running for a minimum of two years.
- Next notice expected249 days ago20 Feb 2026, 23:59 GMT
- Tender notice published230 days ago11 Mar 2026, 17:15 GMT
- Clarification questions by214 days ago27 Mar 2026, 23:59 GMT
- Latest notice published209 days ago1 Apr 2026, 14:46 BST
- Submission deadline198 days ago13 Apr 2026, 11:00 BST
- Award decision expected by134 days ago15 Jun 2026, 23:59 BST
- Contract starts57 days ago1 Sept 2026, 00:00 BST
Notice history
7 events · 3 releases on Find a Tender · since 26 Nov 2025- Preliminary market engagement notice published26 Nov 2025, 17:17 GMTUK2
- Tender notice published11 Mar 2026, 17:15 GMTUK4
- Status changed to active11 Mar 2026, 17:15 GMT
- Procurement method changed11 Mar 2026, 17:15 GMT
- Deadline published: 13 Apr 2026, 11:00 BST11 Mar 2026, 17:15 GMT
- Procurement termination notice published1 Apr 2026, 14:46 BSTUK12
- Status changed to cancelled1 Apr 2026, 14:46 BST
Commercial outcome & contract awards
Published awards, contracts and bid statistics, not a forecast| Awarded to | Value | Date | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| supplier not published | — | 1 Apr 2026 | CancelledSuffolk County Council have decided to cancel tender ref PA0035 due to key changes in the tender documentation. Following this, we plan to issue a new tender under a separate tender notice in due course. We anticipate the new tender reference to be PA0035-1. |
Contracting authority & participating public bodies
Official documents & specifications (3)
Official links; attachments are not copiedNotices published for this procedure
- Procurement termination notice Procurement termination notice on Find a Tender
- Tender notice Tender notice on Find a Tender
- Preliminary market engagement notice Preliminary market engagement notice on Find a Tender