Decision details

Report seeking approval to continue to procure Library Books and other Materials for the next 3 years through the North West and Yorkshire Book Consortium.

That the Cabinet Member approves the strategy of procuring library books and other materials through the North West and Yorkshire Book Consortium Framework Agreement for the next 3 financial years until 2023.

The reasons for the recommendation are as follows:

• It is essential that the Library Service continues to be able to provide a regular supply of new library books and other materials to our customers, both adult and children.

• The previous arrangements have now lapsed, and the adult supplier has cancelled all materials ordered in advance as they no longer have the contract and cannot honour the orders.

• Usual practice is to order books 3 months in advance, so new orders must be placed in order to mitigate delays, and complaints from our customers.

• The new framework arrangements have more favourable purchasing terms than the previous arrangements so taking advantage of this will ensure continuity of supply for our clients and will demonstrate better financial value.

·         We would not secure the terms and discounts on offer as part of a wider collaborative group if we tendered this in our own right. We would also incur additional costs in the requirement to resource any tender we did alone.

1.    The consortium considered a number of options before utilising the ESPO framework.  The existing contract had already been extended in accordance with its terms and so a further extension was not feasible.  A full independent OJEU compliant tender process was also considered. Although undertaken in the past, this was rejected as the potential market is limited, timescales more rigid, and the costs significantly higher than using an already negotiated compliant Framework.

2.    A separate independent tender by SCC was also rejected due to the additional workload and costs and the likelihood of less favourable terms.  A lone tender by SCC would involve procurement costs and would be unlikely to be able to achieve the same or better terms.  The terms/costs achieved by the consortium framework were possible because of the economies of scale.