Details of contracts

WQ.118/2021

WRITTEN QUESTION TO THE ASSISTANT CHIEF MINISTER BY DEPUTY I. GARDINER OF ST. HELIER

QUESTION SUBMITTED ON MONDAY 15th MARCH 2021 ANSWER TO BE TABLED ON MONDAY 22nd MARCH 2021

Question

Will the Minister provide details in relation to any contracts the Government of Jersey has signed with Credera (formerly The DMW Group Ltd) and any other contracts in which Credera and / or DMW Group Ltd was a subcontractor, with particular reference to –

1. the purpose of the contract and the details of the work which Credera or The DMW Group Ltd was asked to undertake;
2. the overall cost of the contract and the overall amounts paid to Credera or The DMW Group Ltd;
3. whether a structured needs assessment was carried out prior to the granting of any such contract and, if not, the reasons why no such assessment was conducted;
4. whether post-consultancy analyses were carried out in relation to any such contract, resulting in the production of a formal report, and, if not, the reasons why this was not done; and
5. whether Credera or The DMW Group Ltd was selected following a tender process on each occasion and, where a tender process was followed, the number of bids that were received for the work and the opening and closing dates of the tender processes?

Answer

The Government of Jersey has one contract with DMW (Credera), they are not a subcontractor to any other Government of Jersey contract.

The overall purpose of the contract is to provide Procurement Partner Services to the GOJ which includes the preparation, support and delivery of all of the activities needed to successfully conclude two contracts; 1) Delivery Partner and 2) Programme Partner for the Integrated Technology Solution (ITS). It also includes an assurance role after the procurements are complete, to ensure continuity and oversight of the delivery of the procured services.

The scope of services provided by DMW (Credera) includes the following:

• Developing the requirements specification for the Delivery Partner  (technical, implementation and business change requirements) and the Programme Partner (service specifications and requirements)

• Gather business and technical requirements, develop the business change approach and develop the programme implementation approach.

• Procurement Services

• Develop a detailed procurement strategy, create wide market interest in the programme and thereafter manage market engagement, deliver multiple procurements, develop detailed specification requirements and the approach for the ITS implementation.

• Conduct end to end Procurement exercise(s) to appoint a Delivery Partner (Business Change, Systems Integration and Technology Solution) and a Programme Partner (Programme Management and Programme Support services) to include pre-qualification and down selection process, competitive dialogue process, commercial / legal evaluation, due diligence on bidders and contract finalisation.

• Provide professional services and subject matter experts to develop and complete the full business case in relation to the Integrated Technology Solution and support the development of internal briefings and papers.

• Programme delivery

• Lead the programme management
• Develop, build and manage the governance processes
• Develop RAID management approach.

Knowledge Transfer and Upskilling (Procurement)

The scale and complexity of the ITS procurements have not been experienced previously by the internal Government commercial team. The DMW team supported the Government in developing new capabilities in conducting complex procurements based on a Competitive Dialogue progress, making the market for new services required, and establishing appropriate commercial and contractual models for risk transfer to

the suppliers.

Business Change Services including Intelligent Client Function

In May 2020 it was recognised by the ITS Steering Board that Government's Business Readiness was on the critical path in terms of successful delivery of the ITS programme and that progress was not being achieved at the pace necessary to ensure that the Government would be ready to commence implementation by the time that the procurements were completed. The ability for the Government to support the required activities was impacted by the redeployment of staff to critical business continuity activities to support the response to COVID 19 and the difficulty of recruiting suitably skilled candidates to vacant posts during the pandemic. Recognising the challenge, it was agreed to supplement resources from a third party.

A review of the suppliers capable of undertaking this work revealed that many known potential providers were participating in the ITS procurement process, either as lead bidder or consortium member and were therefore conflicted. Further, undertaking a separate procurement for this activity would have delayed the start of the business readiness work and would have required the team to put on hold the primary procurements whilst they undertook this separate procurement, thereby, adding delay to the whole programme. In addition, through the requirements gathering phase, DMW (Credera) had built up a detailed knowledge of both the organisation and what business readiness activity was required and could, therefore, "hit the ground running". In order to progress the programme and ensure that the business readiness activities were completed on time, a contract variation to the existing contract with DMW (Credera) was agreed (By Deputy Scott Wickenden). A number of roles were filled by DMW (Credera) to support the business readiness activities required and also to support with the design and implementation of the Intelligent Client function.

This was an additional Service to the original contract with DMW (Credera).

Knowledge Transfer and Upskilling (Agile)

The DMW team brought experts to work in an agile way with the Government. This made a significant contribution to Government employees becoming familiar with an agile approach and developing agile skills. These skills will be particularly beneficiary during the ITS implementation phase.

6. the overall cost of the contract and the overall amounts paid to Credera or The DMW Group Ltd;

Answer

The Contract commenced 13th January 2020 for one year. The contract provides the Authority (GOJ) with the option to extend the Agreement by three years in 3 increments of 12 months. This option has been exercised and the contract was extended for 1 year commencing 13th January 2021.

In addition, a contract addendum was made in July 2020 that enabled the inclusion of business change services to be provided as set out in response to Question (a)

The original contract value for Procurement Services was in the sum of £1,497,875.

Taking into account the contract variation and a contract extension of 1 year to conclude the Procurements and support GOJ with business change activities the overall amounts paid to DMW are set out below:

Procurement Services    £2,7m Business Change Services  £1.6m Total paid to DMW   £4.3m

7. whether a structured needs assessment was carried out prior to the granting of any such contract a and, if not, the reasons why no such assessment was conducted;

Answer

The need for Commercial, Procurement and Legal support was identified in the Integrated Technology Solution Outline Business Case (approved September 2019). This was further defined in the Procurement Strategy which sets out, amongst other criteria:- the procurement approach, scope of work, approach to evaluation, benefits realisation, key performance indicators and governance arrangements.

8. Whether post-consultancy analyses were carried out in relation to any such contract, resulting in the production of a formal report, and, if not, the reasons why this was not done;

Answer

The procurement phase of the ITS programme for which DWM (Credera) are contracted has not yet completed. A Project Closure Report will be completed at the point where the procurement phase is complete which will include a review of the DMW (Credera) contract.

9. whether Credera or The DMW Group Ltd was selected following a tender process on each occasion and, where a tender process was followed, the number of bids that were received for the work and the opening and closing dates of the tender processes?

Answer

DMW (Credera) were selected following a tender process. The Tender was openly advertised on the GoJ procurement portal ( www.channelislandstenders.com ) on the 18th October 2019.

Six (6) companies submitted compliant bids and were assessed against the advertised pre-determined minimal threshold requirements. Three (3) companies were taken through to a final evaluation stage. The Invitation to Tender was published on www.channelislandstenders.com on Friday 18th October 2019 and the deadline for Tender Responses was Monday 2nd December 2019.