The headlines about commissioning have been prolific in recent months. Cambridgeshire’s CEO, Stephen Moir, blasted a ‘broken system’ as his Authority was paying £85k per week on one child’s care placement. Whilst Solace President, Matt Prosser, said ‘it’s not right that children’s providers make super profits’. The sector spends over £70 billion per annum on external suppliers the vast majority of which is on vulnerable people, so it was very timely for Peopletoo to be leading a workshop at the CCN Conference on Strategic Commissioning.
So, what did we take from the session?
Firstly, external spend is increasing year on year. It’s at levels that is strategically important to organisations so needs to be under intensive scrutiny. Vulnerable people make up the significant proportion of the total spend. Growth is also being experienced in spend on temporary housing, so this is definitely an area to watch. The session concluded that commissioning has to be at the heart of organisational decision making and a significant factor at Board level both politically and managerially. It also concluded that opportunities to derive further value form commissioning were also apparent. A good discussion took place with some of our key takeaways being:
- Collectively sharing commissioning intelligence as Councils to drive improvements in commissioning
- Ensuring effective and impactful workforce development and career progression for local authority commissioners
- Commissioning and contract managing strongly to ensure transparency of cost and delivery of outcomes/value for money
- Improving joint strategic commissioning relationships with ICBs
Peopletoo will be carrying out a research project on the value that can be derived from Strategic Commissioning with the CCN. We hope to publish the work in early 2024 so if you are interested in participating please let Maggie Kenney know at maggie.kenney@peopletoo.co.uk