Department of Justice

c/o Construction Procurement Delivery, Clare House, 303 Airport Road West

Belfast

BT3 9ED

UK

E-mail: justice.cpd@finance-ni.gov.uk

NUTS: UKN0

Internet address(es)

Main address: https://www.justice-ni.gov.uk/

Address of the buyer profile: https://www.finance-ni.gov.uk/topics/procurement

II.1.1) Title

Reference number: DoJ DAC 16/22

II.1.2) Main CPV code

79710000

II.1.3) Type of contract

Services

II.1.4) Short description

The Department of Justice (DoJ) has awarded a short-term interim contract for the provision of services for Electronic Monitoring (EM) of offenders in Northern Ireland. The

Department has statutory obligations under Article 35 of Criminal Justice (Northern Ireland) Order 2008, which provides for EM as a condition of court bail, post-release licence or range of community supervision orders for adults and young persons. The scope of EM is a public protection tool for both the judiciary and for criminal justice agencies monitoring offenders in the community.

II.1.6) Information about lots

This contract is divided into lots: No

II.1.7) Total value of the procurement

Value excluding VAT: 2 400 000.00  GBP

IV.1.1) Type of procedure

Award of a contract without prior publication of a call for competition

Justification for selected award procedure:

The procurement falls outside the scope of application of the Directive

Explanation

DoJ awarded a contract in 2018, which was terminated prior to going live. To ensure service continuity, DoJ extended the existing contract while a new competitive process was initiated

in January 2020. Pre-market engagement responses were receipted early 2020 and about to be assessed when the COVID pandemic hit. The new process had to be put on hold immediately as DoJ and CPD resources were prioritised to COVID response activities. DoJ had to ensure delivery of business as usual for this critical service while working around constraints and working conditions imposed by the pandemic. The current contract was due to expire in October 2022.

Provision of this service is a statutory requirement under the Criminal Justice (NI) Order 2008 and there are serious legal and public protection ramifications if it is not in place. Lack of service would significantly impact on the ability to manage the risk of those on bail or those who have been released subject to licence conditions, who are often released on the basis of an EM curfew being in place. In Northern Ireland, there is the added risk and profile of tagging high risk terrorist subjects, with substantial legal scrutiny and press interest in this matter.

There are derogations under the Public Contracts Regulations to award a contract where the supplies or services can only be supplied by a particular supplier for the following reasons: -

a) Where competition is absent for technical reasons (regulation 32(2) (b) (ii)); but only, where no reasonable alternative or substitute exists and the absence of competition is not the result of an artificial narrowing down of the parameters of the procurement.

b) Regulation 32(5)(b) for additional deliveries by the original supplier which are intended either as a partial replacement of supplies or installations or as the extension of existing supplies or installations where a change of supplier would oblige the contracting authority to acquire supplies having different technical characteristics which would result in incompatibility or disproportionate technical difficulties in operation and maintenance.

The current service is very complex, high risk with serious legal ramifications if it fails e.g. adverse public protection outcomes, including in respect of terrorist related offenders; legal

challenges and associated financial penalties for the department; ECHR and deprivation of liberty related issues where EM is not available to manage release on bail or licence. There are high switching costs and high technical thresholds which require a significant period of testing to satisfy the Department and stakeholders that another provider could deliver the service to the required standard. This would include multiple field and breach

reporting tests, equipment/hardware tests, process testing and interoperability with existing DOJ/CJO systems.

Pre-market engagement was completed to aid the new procurement process which identified a lack of awareness/understanding of the NI Criminal Justice system, and

highlighted that a limited number of suppliers had any geographic footprint locally. This is a specialist and limited market.

As equipment and installations are a large proportion of the contract, retaining the incumbent is the only option. It will be VFM in that there is stable, quality service delivery that will ensure the Department can deliver its statutory obligations. There will be no

requirement to purchase new equipment until the new contract is in place. Any other provider would have to bring in new equipment/new technology etc all of which would need to be robustly tested over time.

This will be an interim contract to ensure continuity of services while a tender process (already initiated) occurs. The anticipated go live date is 1st April 2024. The tender opportunity and Contract Notice will be advertised in FTS in due course.

IV.1.8) Information about Government Procurement Agreement (GPA)

The procurement is covered by the Government Procurement Agreement: Yes

IV.2.1) Previous publication concerning this procedure

Notice number in the OJ S:

2022/S 000-025508

Information withheld for security reasons

Information withheld for security reasons

Information withheld for security reasons

UK

NUTS: UK

The contractor is an SME: No

VI.4.1) Review body

VI.4.3) Review procedure

Precise information on deadline(s) for review procedures:

The UK does not have any special review body with responsibility for appeal/mediation procedures in public procurement competitions. Instead, any challenges are dealt with by the High Court, Commercial Division, to which proceedings may be issued regarding alleged breaches of the Public Contracts Regulations 2015.