Wednesday 2 June 2010

That meeting

Some news of the meeting between Chris Grayling (with David Freud, the designer of the Work Programme) and the New Deal providers, from the Carley Consult site. It looks like there will be a new tender process in the FND phase 2 areas, while in the phase 1 areas, where it's already operating, the existing contracts will be renegotiated. The government wants interim contracts to tide them over to the full roll-out next year. Each of the current providers will be able to put their views to the ministers in separate meetings.
One paragraph needs some decoding. "There was a strong preference shown for greater collaboration and partnership, with the inclusion of the third sector and smaller providers likely to be a minimum specification requirement, and effectively ending the notion of sole provider delivery models. The needs of an increasingly diverse customer group, with a growing emphasis on customers on health related benefits, underlined the drive to bring together a mixed economy of provider expertise. Indeed, the direction may see traditional prime provider rivals working on a true consortia basis for the first time." I don't see a great deal of difference between that and what exists at the moment; it just means that the prime contractors have to get more smaller organisations on board before they bid.
Apparently the ministers stressed their commitment to payment only for outcomes, and "some providers continue to seek reassurance that such a model will pay in practice".

2 comments:

  1. I think that translates roughly as "you're going to force loads of sick and disabled people onto JSA, we know these people won't get jobs but we want paying anyway and we'll also do a lot of subcontracting so we've got someone to blame when it finally becomes obvious that its a huge failure"

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  2. I agree with Anons analysis, and would also add that I can see reneogitation of contracts taking months with some providers dropping out when they see how little profit there will be

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