Light touch contracts under the Procurement Act 2023: which services qualify and what actually changes

The key facts

• Light touch contracts are contracts for certain social, health, education and other public services.
• They are subject to more flexible procurement rules than other contracts.
• The common feature of these services is that they are provided directly to individuals or groups of people, which is why they warrant special treatment and greater flexibility.
• The Act contains specific derogations and flexibilities for these contracts.
• Where there is no specific provision for light touch contracts, there is no difference from the general provisions in the Act.
• The legal framework is section 9 of the Act and Schedule 1.
• Authorities awarding light touch contracts need to understand the whole of the Act, since provisions such as competitive tendering procedures, conditions of participation and award criteria apply as they do elsewhere.
• The guidance on thresholds, exempted contracts and mixed procurement is particularly relevant to determining whether a contract falls within the light touch provisions.

What this guidance is and who it applies to

This is one of the technical guidance documents published to support the Procurement Act 2023. It explains what light touch contracts are and how the Act treats them. As with the rest of the series it is written for procurement practitioners and commercial policy leads in contracting authorities, and it should be read in conjunction with the Act and its associated regulations.

In practice its audience is broader. Light touch services are commissioned by social care teams, health commissioners, education services and children's services as much as by central procurement functions, and many of the people running these processes are commissioners first and procurement practitioners second.

Providers have an equal interest. A large part of the voluntary, community and social enterprise sector delivers exactly the kind of services the light touch provisions cover, and understanding where flexibility exists helps providers engage with commissioners about process design rather than simply receiving it.

Which contracts qualify and why they are treated differently

The guidance describes light touch contracts as contracts for certain social, health, education and other public services which are subject to more flexible procurement rules. The word certain is important. It is not a general category defined by service area but a defined list, and the definition sits in section 9 of the Act together with Schedule 1.

The rationale given is unusually clear and worth carrying into commissioning conversations. One thing these services have in common is that they are provided directly to individuals or groups of people, and therefore warrant special treatment and greater flexibility. The justification is not that these services are less important or lower value. It is that the relationship between provider and person receiving the service is the point of the contract, and a procurement process built around commodity supply does not serve that well.

That framing has practical consequences. It supports commissioning approaches that give weight to continuity of care, relationships, local knowledge and the preferences of the people using the service. It also explains why the flexibility exists at all: to allow a process shaped around the nature of the service rather than one imposed on it.

What does not change

The guidance is careful to limit the effect of the flexibilities, and this is the part most likely to be missed. Where there is no specific provision for light touch contracts, there is no difference from the general provisions in the Act. The Act contains specific derogations and flexibilities, and outside those specific points the ordinary rules apply unchanged.

It goes further. Contracting authorities awarding light touch contracts will need to understand the whole of the Act, because the same provisions apply as apply to other contracting authorities. The examples given are competitive tendering procedures, conditions of participation and award criteria. Those are core mechanics of any procurement, and light touch status does not remove them.

This means light touch is not a lighter version of the whole regime. It is the same regime with named exceptions. A commissioning team that treats light touch as permission to run an informal process is applying the flexibility far more widely than the Act allows, and the parts of the file that will be examined in a challenge are usually the ordinary parts, not the flexible ones.

Applying it in practice

The first step is determining whether a contract actually falls within the light touch provisions. That assessment is made against section 9 and Schedule 1, and the guidance flags three documents as particularly relevant to it: thresholds, exempted contracts and mixed procurement. Those are the areas where the answer is least obvious and most consequential.

Mixed procurement is the frequent problem. Service packages often combine light touch elements with services that fall outside the list, or bundle a care service with transport, catering, estates or technology. Deciding which rules govern a mixed package requires a considered and recorded decision rather than a default to the more convenient answer.

Once qualification is settled, the useful discipline is to write down which specific flexibilities are being used and why, and to run everything else as a standard procurement. That gives commissioners the room the Act intends while keeping the file defensible. It also makes the process explainable to providers, who generally respond well to a clear statement of how a competition will run and why it has been designed that way.

How eSourcing Data helps

Light touch commissioning needs a platform that can flex without becoming informal. eSourcing Data supports proportionate workflows for light touch contracts while still capturing the standard elements the Act requires, so a commissioning team can design a process around the service and still produce a complete, structured record of what it did.

The classification decision is captured up front. Where a package mixes light touch and other services, or sits near a threshold or exemption boundary, the assessment, valuation basis and reasoning are held in the procurement record, which is exactly the material needed if the route is later questioned.

Supplier management is the other practical benefit. Many light touch providers are small, voluntary or community based organisations that engage with public procurement infrequently. eSourcing Data gives them a single, straightforward route to register, respond and manage their information, which lowers the barrier to participation and keeps the market that these services depend on engaged.

What to do about it

1. 1Check qualification against section 9 and Schedule 1 rather than assuming a service area is covered.
2. 2Read the thresholds, exempted contracts and mixed procurement guidance when determining whether the light touch provisions apply.
3. 3Record a clear decision where a package mixes light touch services with other requirements.
4. 4List the specific flexibilities being relied on for each light touch procurement, and run everything else as a standard process.
5. 5Train commissioners on the whole Act, since competitive tendering procedures, conditions of participation and award criteria still apply.
6. 6Design processes that reflect the direct to individual nature of these services, including continuity and user preference where appropriate.
7. 7Keep participation simple for small and voluntary sector providers who bid infrequently.