In line with the Public Services (Social Value) Act (2013), which requires public sector organisations to consider wider economic, social and environmental outcomes in procurement, this group aims to support and strengthen the delivery of social value across local government. The group will focus on sharing and promoting good practice, particularly how councils collaborate locally to embed social value, and exploring approaches to measuring and evidencing impact. It will consider the effectiveness of social value since its introduction, support the development and use of measurement tools, and provide practical guidance, case studies and resources for councils. Additionally, the group will respond to emerging policy changes, support alignment with national priorities such as net zero through collaboration with the Sustainability Action Network and explore how social value can be embedded more consistently through devolution, local government reorganisation, and effective contract management.
Background
The Local Government Association (LGA) is the national voice of local government. We work with councils to support, promote and improve local government.
The LGA is a politically led, cross-party organisation that works on behalf of councils to ensure local government has a strong, credible voice with national government. We aim to influence and set the political agenda on the issues that matter to councils, so they can deliver local solutions to national problems. Our National Advisory Group for local government procurement is a long-standing group of senior regional representatives of council procurement officers who work together to:
- Influence, shape and lead national procurement policy, so this works for councils and their local partners
- Identify and share good practice to maximise the benefits of good
- procurement
- Highlight the role of procurement in supporting wider policies,
- improvements, added social value and efficiency savings for the
- sector
- Identify blockers to efficient and collaborative procurement and how
these might be resolved;
- Take account of procurement’s role in relation to other groups and bodies such as clinical commissioners, heads of service and new initiatives such as commercialism, combined authorities and local government reorganisation
- Identify, influence and improve access to procurement related training to local government
- Provide leadership on issues relating to local government procurement through the issue, update and refresh of a National Procurement Strategy
Councils have long recognised the importance that procurement and commissioning can play in delivering efficiencies, value for money and contributing to transforming service delivery.
Councils have been including social value considerations in their procurement processes since the Public Services (Social Value) Act 2012 came into effect, achieving additional social value across all services, but little work has so far been done on understanding the impact of this practice (with the exception of financial impact work undertaken by Social Value Portal and others using proxy financial values).
According to the July 2025 Cabinet Office consultation document ‘Public Procurement, growing British industry, Jobs and Skills’ “industry representative bodies still report too frequently that SMEs find social value requirements difficult to navigate and that performance is poorly managed”.
The Government are consulting on whether to streamline social value efforts, focussing on the most impactful contracts over £5 million to create a more meaningful dialogue with suppliers. However, the Act baseline is much lower.
Subjects in scope for the group:
- Bringing out good practice in how councils have collaborated within their own places, for example through their ‘anchor’ networks or with local organisations to embed achievement of social value.
- Working with other organisations to consider assessing the high-level impact of social value clauses since 2013
- Supporting councils to measure their own impact
- Use of measurement tools or the proposed new set of cross government measurement criteria, and how these apply to contracts under the £5m threshold, producing guidance, case studies and tools to encourage the use of best practice across all types of local authorities in line with their local proposition
- Given the legal requirement for net zero by 2050, collaborating with the LGA’s Sustainability Action Network to identify and progress complementarity between Net Zero and Social Value.
- Responding to policy changes eg the proposed ‘streamlined list’ of what types of social value to include in tenders and commenting on how the National Procurement Policy Statement enables social value across the sector.
- Considering what could be best practice in including social value for a wider area through LGR and devolution
- Finding and publishing case studies and guidance on how social value is contract-managed through the life of contracts, how KPIs are measured and achieved and ensuring contract management training, including focus on social value is targeted at contract managers
Membership and Scope
The Group membership is made up of senior local government procurement/commissioning professionals who lead a procurement team or a wider service area, with at least one representative per English region. Representatives from local government in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland will be included.
The LGA supports the Group by enabling councils to collaborate and share best practice to deliver more effective services with limited resources.
The Group will work with each other as a cohesive voice to:
- Help councils achieve better outcomes for residents
- Influence, shape and lead national social value policy, so this works for councils and their local partners.
- Identify and share good practice to maximise the benefits of good procurement, as well as communicate and support local government colleagues to adopt identified good practice.
- Encourage collaboration to help councils make savings or add value.
- Learn about and engage with new and innovative ways of working.
- Be proactive rather than reactive.
- Engage and work with providers and member bodies to develop future social value practices
Member Responsibilities
- To attend (or appoint an appropriate substitute) quarterly meetings
- To suggest suitable items and contribute to the meeting agenda
- To contribute to discussions on shaping the national social value policy agenda
- To identify and share good practice with other members and the wider local government procurement networks
- To promote the work of the Group to colleagues and networks as appropriate
- To make the Group aware of developments, issues and changes in their local area with regards to the development, measurement and impact of social value
- To engage with providers through conferences, fora, ‘meet the buyer’ days etc and disseminate local government’s key messages
Meeting Governance
The LGA will convene, Chair and provide administrative support for all meetings, including circulating all meeting papers/presentations one week in advance of the meeting and produce the meetings notes.
The LGA engages with a wide range of organisations and may from time to time invite speakers from organisations such as the Cabinet Office, other Government departments, members of Social Value UK and others to attend and present to the Group.
The Group will report regularly to the LGA’s National Advisory Group who themselves report to the Improvement Committee of the LGA.
Meetings and Communications
Hybrid meetings will take place quarterly. A Teams group could be set up for communication between meetings.
Communications, including meeting notes and actions will be circulated after each meeting by email and available on the Teams group.
Confidentiality
The Group is a safe space for the sharing of information, notable practice and problem solving. It is an environment where open discussion is supported and encouraged. The regional leads identified for this group will be identified on the Procurement Hub section of the LGA Website.
The LGA will hold your contact information for use only in relation to the activities of this Group in accordance with the LGA’s Privacy Notice
The terms of reference will be due for review on an annual basis.