Policy paper

CCS social value policy

Updated 8 February 2021

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This publication is available at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/crown-commercial-service-social-value-policy/ccs-social-value-policy

1. Introduction

As the UK’s largest public procurement organisation, we are committed to helping our customers across all parts of the public sector deliver maximum value for money for the taxpayer.

We use our national buying power and extensive depth and breadth of procurement expertise to develop market leading commercial solutions for the procurement of common goods and services that ensure value for customers of all sizes. These solutions help our customers focus more of their precious time and resources on delivering their key priorities.

We also know that for many of our customers across the public sector, maximising value means both saving money and securing social value. We are committed to ensuring that we can help them to achieve this at all stages of the procurement process.

2. Social value

Social value legislation1 requires buyers of public sector services to consider whether there are related social, economic or environmental benefits that can be delivered through the contract.

We are committed to being a leader in social value and want you to be confident that we always have the right commercial solutions in place to help you deliver real benefits - whether that is creating more apprenticeships, reducing carbon emissions in your local area or your own unique local priorities.

We will do this by:

  • listening to our customers, understanding your needs and learning from other organisations
  • making sure all relevant new deals offer you social value opportunities and give you the flexibility to specify and evaluate social value at call-off
  • reviewing our current deals to identify social value opportunities
  • working with our suppliers so they are ready to respond to your requirements
  • providing tools and guidance to help you build social value into your procurements and measure the social value element of bids received
  • making these tools available for you to use on all your procurements, not just when you are buying from CCS

3. Measurement

We will ensure that our approach is helping you to leave a positive social, economic and environmental legacy by:

  • monitoring our deals to check for social value delivery in practice
  • seeking regular feedback from customers and stakeholders to confirm our approach
  • monitoring our commercial arrangements to check that we stay up to date with emerging policy and best practice

1 The Public Services (Social Value) Act 2012, the Procurement Reform (Scotland) Act 2014 and the Well Being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015

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