Councils win places on £30-90m HealthTrust Europe legal services panels

Three local authority legal teams – Kent Legal Services, Staffordshire Legal Services and nplaw – have secured places on HealthTrust Europe’s legal services panels, which have an estimated value of £30-90m.

HealthTrust Europe is a purchasing body for the health sector that provides support to more than 400 public and private sector organisations.

The framework agreement, which is for two years with the option for two 12-month extensions, was split into eight lots:

1. Corporate governance
2. Healthcare law;
3. Contract and commercial law;
4. Employment, pensions and employee related tax law;
5. Property law and estates;
6. Corporate finance and Private Finance Initiative/Public Private Partnership law;
7. Intellectual property, IT, telecoms, media and e-commerce law;
8. Environmental law.

Kent Legal Services was one of the big winners on the framework agreement, being the most economically advantageous bidder for all five lots for which it bid (lots 1, 3, 4, 5 and 8).

Norfolk-based nplaw has secured places on three lots (3, 4, 7) while Staffordshire Legal Services is understood to have been appointed to at least four of the lots (1, 3, 4, 5).

Local Government Lawyer has asked HealthTrust Europe to provide a full list of the successful organisations, but had not received this information before publication.

A number of leading health law firms – such as Bevan Brittan, Browne Jacobson, Capsticks, Clyde & Co, DAC Beachcroft, Hempsons, Hill Dickinson, RadcliffesLeBrasseur, Ward Hadaway and Weightmans – are known to have been appointed.

Geoff Wild, Director of Governance and Law at Kent County Council and head of Kent Legal Services, said: “A great deal of hard work went into this successful bid by a great many of our staff, for which I am extremely grateful. Particular thanks, however, must go to Sarah Bonser who successfully led the KLS bid throughout its eight-month tender process.”

Call-off contracts will be entered into in respect of each lot, either directly or following a mini-competition. There will be scope for crossover both between lots and into areas not included in those lots, such as adult social welfare.

Initially operating as a collaborative procurement hub within the NHS, hosted by University Hospital Coventry and Warwickshire NHS Trust (UHCW), Healthtrust Europe was purchased by Hospital Corporation of America (HCA) and HealthTrust in the US in 2011.

The framework is to be made available to all NHS bodies in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland as well as all social enterprises “undertaking some or all of what were previously the service provider functions of contracting authorities in relation to health and/or social care services”. 

It will also be available to other contracting authorities such as ministerial departments, local authorities, emergency services, educational establishments and registered providers of social housing.