Who are we and what do we do

Commissioning is the process of specifying, securing and monitoring services to meet the needs of individuals both in the short and long term. This can involve joint commissioning with both internal and external partners, such as in healthcare.

The Commissioning Service area is responsible for the commissioning of services for adults, children and public health by:

• Forecasting demand for services
• Ensuring quality of service provision and changes in market development
• Understanding value for money
• Operating a robust contracting and procurement process

We commission services which are directly provided to North Tyneside residents which promote resilience, independence, progression and recovery in terms of:

• Daily living and life skills
• Education, skills and employability
• Health, care and wellbeing
• Citizenship and community engagement

This includes providing accountability in our contract processes, ensuring high quality services and value for money.

We manage relationships with a large and diverse number of service providers across all markets and client groups.

The Commissioning Service brings together the commissioning and contract monitoring function across adult, children and public health services. Commissioners and workers involved in procurement and contracting are at the forefront of ensuring that the provision of social care and other commissioned services (such as education, public health) are of high quality and based on need and delivery of improved outcomes for people who use services.

The commissioning service covers the entire process of aggregating information on the needs of people in a local area, designing and securing services to meet this need and then monitoring and evaluating the impact this has made on individuals and groups.

This is set out in the commissioning cycle and shows the link between strategic commissioning and contracting/procurement of services to meet need.

The service works with the council’s Strategic Procurement Unit in purchasing services provided by external partners including the private, voluntary and independent sectors.

The service works across 2 categories:

One of the principal aims is to ensure that future commissioning is more person/family/community centred. This takes a holistic view of:

• Key life stages, transition points or events
• Life time disability and need
• The customer experience

There are a number of key strategies and documents which support the work of the service:

Joint Strategic Needs Assessment

This is a joint assessment with North Tyneside CCG considering the needs of the local population in North Tyneside and how effective commissioning of services will properly meet those needs. It provides a clear understanding of the needs of the whole population and the wider determinants of health, from both the perspective of the NHS and the local authority.

North Tyneside Joint Health and Wellbeing Strategy (2013-2023) 

This outlines the top joint priorities for improving the health and wellbeing of people living in North Tyneside. It is developed through the Health and Wellbeing Board, with a range of partnership groups that exist within the borough and with the communities of North Tyneside.

Market Position Statements (MPS)

A MPS is a market facing document that sets out information for care/support providers and others about the local authority’s commissioning intentions and what this means for the current and future supply market.

We have a section dedicated to our Market Position Statement  for Adult Social Care - You can view this here

It aims to support current organisations to review what they are doing in North Tyneside and think about their service provision and if it needs to change to reflect future commissioning intentions.

It is also aimed at new organisations that are not currently delivering services in North Tyneside and who may want to think about entering the market in the future.

In addition, the service also supported and informed the production of the MPS for specialist housing in North Tyneside, which sets out information for providers of housing about the type of specialist housing that the council understands is needed for: 

• Older people 
• People with a learning disability 
• People with a physical disability 
• Young people leaving care

Scott Woodhouse    
Head of Commissioning, Adults
Telephone: (0191) 643 7082    
Email: scott.woodhouse@northtyneside.gov.uk

Mark Taylor        
Head of Commissioning, Children and Families
Telephone: (0191) 643 8755    
Email: mark.taylor@northtyneside.gov.uk

Commissioning Work Leads

For individual contacts and details of adult services commissioning staff,  please see here

Commissioning Service

Telephone:
Commissioning Team: (0191) 643 7100
General enquiries: 0345 2000 101 

Email: commissioning@northtyneside.gov.uk