Construction and engineering contractors have been notified about a £1.5bn framework for works at the Houses of Parliament.
The Corporate Officers of the House of Lords and House of Commons have issued a prior information notice (PIN) for a new Parliamentary Construction Partnership (PCP) Framework. This upcoming tender will appoint contractors to execute the medium-term investment plan for the Parliamentary Estate.
According to the Corporate Officers, the Parliamentary Estate has a “unique built asset portfolio” and has a total gross internal floor areas exceeding 250,000m2. Approximately 70% of the buildings on the Parliamentary Estate are listed under Heritage status, with two buildings, Norman Shaw North and the Palace of Westminster, being Grade I Listed.
The Corporate Officers emphasize Parliament's duty of care to prevent deterioration of mechanical, electrical, public health, fire, and life safety systems through ongoing maintenance of building fabric, roofing, stonework, and other associated works and projects.
The appointees for the PCP Framework will be known as the Strategic Estates team. This team will serve both Houses and be responsible for the infrastructure comprising the Parliamentary Estate.
Its work will encompass “a broad set of responsibilities, including the delivery of construction projects, construction safety, the provision of specialist planning and design support, and the care and development of our internationally significant heritage collections, among others”.
The PIN goes on to say: “As the requirement for these services and works continues to increase across the Parliamentary Estate, the procurement of this new Framework, and its services and works, is required to maintain the capability and capacity to construct and deliver projects that are part of the portfolio of capital investment and capital maintenance projects that constitute the medium-term investment plan, into the early 2030s.”
The new framework will be a successor to the existing Mechanical, Electrical, Public health, and Fabric Safety Framework. The PCP Framework will build on the content of the previous framework, incorporating lessons learnt through its use over the lastf ew years, and the feedback and thoughts from internal and external stakeholders “to ensure this Framework is fit for purpose going forward”.
The new Framework “seeks to ensure that the Corporate Officers have access to a proportionate and resilient number of capable contractors, across several Lots, with different specialisms and disciplines, who can undertake the wide range of construction works and services required to meet the needs of the medium term investment plan and Estate Masterplan”.
The authority is looking to engage contractors with the capability and capacity to lead, co-ordinate and manage the delivery of works projects. Core works will ideally be delivered by Contractors’ in-house capability, with specialist works delivered in conjunction with the contractors’ established supply chains.
The Lots are divided up as:
- Lot 1: Higher value construction works of mixed discipline, circa £30M and over
- Lot 2: Medium value construction works, predominantly mechanical and electrical, over circa £3M but under circa £30M
- Lot 3: Medium value construction works, predominantly of architectural, heritage, roofing and conservational discipline, up to circa £30M
- Lot 4: Low / minor value construction works of mixed discipline up to circa £3M
The threshold and values are not fixed at this stage and may be adjusted prior to the release of the contract notice.
An invitation to tender will be issued providing full details of the framework, which is estimated to published in July.
Once appointed onto the framework lot, call-off contracts will be awarded based on mini-competition or direct award procedures. Call-off contracts will be based on the NEC4 suite of contracts and utilise a variety of contracting strategies that consider design responsibility, early contractor involvement and one/two stage tendering, and more strategic partnership strategies such as management contracting, and construction management.
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