St Edmundsbury Borough Council (the Council) is based in the historic market towns of Bury St Edmunds and Haverhill in the West of Suffolk. It delivers services to over 104,000 residents, either directly or by employing others to act on its behalf. For more information, please refer to the website The Council wishes to appoint a contractor to carry out maintenance works to trees under the Council's ownership and supervision, in accordance with an agreed Schedule of Rates (the Works). This contract is expected to run for a maximum of 3 years. The Council owns over 130 hectares of Woodland and is responsible for over 14,000 stand alone trees. In 2009 the Council adopted a Tree and Woodland Strategy which set in place a regular cyclical inspection and four year maintenance regimes. The Council's Waste and Street Scene Service will provide an in house arboricultural service but the Council is looking to enter into a contract with an external provider to undertake the more technically complex jobs. The Council has previously spent around £180,000 per annum on the purchase of external arboricultural services, however, with the introduction of an internal arboricultural team this figure will be significantly scaled down. As in previous years the Councils Arboricultural Officer will inspect a quarter of the Council's tree stock and put forward a list of scheduled works for the forthcoming year. The work will involve both scheduled work, identified during these annual inspections, and non-scheduled or reactionary work.