Decision details

The Cabinet Member for Central Services introduced a report on options for the future delivery of services currently provided by Elevate East London under the joint venture partnership agreement between the Council and Agilisys.

The Cabinet Member advised that constructive discussions had taken place with representatives of Elevate and Agilisys and he outlined the four options that had been developed, namely: (1) Do nothing and continue the existing arrangements until the end of the contract in December 2017; (2) Early termination of the contract and the return of all services to the Council; (3) Review and rationalisation of Elevate services, with Elevate retaining the services where it had the most business expertise and was able to add value, together with the return of all other contracted services to the Council; and (4) Enter into a more direct contractual relationship with Agilisys, with Elevate only existing as a procurement shell through which the services would be sub-contracted to Agilisys.

The Cabinet Member referred to the key financial issues and benefits associated with the preferred option (3) and also the conditions sought by Agilisys as part of any agreement, which included the enactment of the three-year extension clause contained in the original contract for the services that were to remain in Elevate and the removal of the 40-day break clause.

Members spoke on their experiences of the Elevate service and sought clarification from officers on issues relating to future management expertise and Elevate’s future standing as a body that could attract new business.  With regard to the conditions sought by Agiliysys, Members confirmed that they would wish for a contract break clause to be retained in some form in order to protect the Council’s interests.

Cabinet resolved to:

(i)  Review and rationalise the existing Elevate East London services as outlined in Option 3 in the report and, as part of that review, to a review of the current break clause provisions (on the proviso that appropriate break clause arrangements are retained) and the enactment of the three-year contractual extension to 2020; and

(ii)  Authorise the Chief Finance Officer, in consultation with relevant Cabinet Members, to continue to progress negotiations with Elevate East London / Agilisys, where appropriate, to implement the agreed option.