NHS North East Essex Clinical Commissioning Group has been working towards the establishment of whole system urgent treatment service collaboration through an alliance contracting model.

This is a contract award notice. NHS North East Essex Clinical Commissioning Group is challenged financially and by the demographics of a growing elderly population within an urgent care system which is currently fragmented, difficult for patients to navigate, open to duplication and facing increasing demand. The CCG has made the decision that working with a group of providers and establishing a whole system urgent treatment service collaboration (the UTS Collaborative) through an alliance contracting model will be the best solution to provide an affordable, sustainable and fully integrated urgent treatment service in North East Essex.

The scale and breadth of the services involved requires the involvement of several providers driving service transformation, sharing risk and responsibility and offering a range of unique and diverse perspectives whilst avoiding fragmentation of service provision.

In August 2017, the CCG published an early engagement notice on the contracts finder website inviting suitably qualified providers to attend what became a series of market engagement events.

In November 2017, the CCG published a prior information notice (2017/S 215-446859) inviting expressions of interest from providers willing to make the commitment to collaboration in an alliance way of working and who believed they had the necessary experience in multi-disciplinary integrated care, willing to work with other statutory providers, willing to work with the current providers and capable of financially holding and managing the scale of risk through a degree of income risk. Only 1 joint expression of interest was received from a group of providers and it is envisaged that this group of providers will join with the CCG to form the collaboration.

In August 2018, the CCG published a Voluntary Ex-Ante Transparency Notice (2018/S 167-381234) notifying of its intention to award this contract.

The full members of the collaboration are:

— East Suffolk and North Essex NHS Foundation Trust,

— Anglian Community Enterprise CIC,

— GP Primary Choice Ltd,

— North East Essex Clinical Commissioning Group.

Associate members of the collaboration are:

— East of England Ambulance Trust,

— Essex Partnership University Foundation Trust,

— Care UK.

The UTS Collaborative will be responsible for the provision of an urgent treatment service in North East Essex. The services included in the scope of the UTS are as follows:

— A&E in Colchester — minors activity,

— GP Streaming service at Colchester Hospital,

— Walk-in Centre in Colchester,

— Minor Injury Units in Clacton and Harwich,

— Primary Care Extended Hours.

The proposed contractual term is for a period of 4 years with an option to extend by a further 3 years. The 36 000 000 GBP value is for the initial 4-year term. In accordance with Regulation 72 (1) (a) of the Public Contracts Regulations 2015, the services covered by the arrangement may change and expand as the partnerships develop through an alliance agreement. Examples of areas that could be considered by the collaboration for future delivery include further A&E activity.