Empowering Kingston's Communities through the Voluntary & Community Sector

The Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames (RBK) is seeking to commission its a service to empower Kingston's communities through the local voluntary & community sector (VCS). Under this heading RBK will be commissioning two Lots: one for infrastructure support for the VCS (Lot 1) and another for supporting volunteers and active citizens (Lot 2). RBK is proud to have a thriving local voluntary & community sector (VCS) that provides a diverse and wide range of services to everyone who works, lives and studies in the borough, as well as being a crucial partner for the Council in terms of strategic planning. The VCS is funded from a variety of sources, including commissioning arrangements with statutory partners (including RBK), successful bids for external funding and charitable donations from residents. Despite challenges caused by austerity and increasing demand on services, RBK is committed to embracing innovation and pioneering ways of working to provide the best outcomes for our residents. The Contract(s) will commence on 1st April 2018 and will be for an initial period of 3 years. The Authority may at its discretion extend the Contract(s) for a further period of up to 2 (two) x 1 (one) years. The tender process selected for this contract is an Open Process, meaning that suppliers will submit responses to Suitability Criteria to assess their competence and capability to deliver the contract at the same time as submitting Tender documents to determine how they will deliver the contract. The successful Service Provider for Lot 1 may be required to take on a head lease from the incumbent provider (held on behalf of a number of local voluntary & community sector organisations) from the contract start date; further information on this head lease can be found in the tender documents available via the London Tenders Portal. Tenderers must indicate their acceptance of this requirement via the relevant suitability question on the London Tenders Portal otherwise they will not be considered for this contract and their responses to the Method Statement questions (as detailed in the Invitation to Tender) will not be scored.