Background

The Commissioned Rehabilitative Services (CRS) are part of His Majesty's Prison Probation Service (HMPPS). They provide flexible support to those in the criminal justice system and are delivered by organisations who have bid for and have been awarded contracts across different regions. Services include: support to access accommodation, support to deal with finances, benefits and debt; dependency and recovery services, as well as personal and emotional wellbeing support.

These contracts are now due to be recommissioned, with new contracts expected to commence in April 2027. This blog focuses on the recommissioning of men’s services, but Clinks expects that market engagement for the women’s services contracts to begin in summer 2025. Register your interest in receiving information about women’s services by completing this questionnaire.

Vision for the Future

There has been a range of consultation with existing contract holders, people on probation and those interested in delivering future services, to develop a new delivery model.

The new contracts will focus on providing a whole person approach, through a Community Links model, connecting people to a range of community-based activities and resources, strengthening their social networks and relationships to improve well-being, desistance from crime and recovery from substance use. This model will provide a single point of contact, ensuring the person on probation receives support to access housing, education and employment and financial support. Services will be delivered in custody, pre-release and in the community, avoiding duplication of other statutory services and provision.

There will be a single contract per specific geographical area with all elements combined. Therefore the value of these contracts will be large (over £1m, except Cumbria and Isle of Wight which are expected to be of smaller values), with 29 contracts across England and Wales. Greater Manchester will continue to be commissioned separately. The contract values are still to be finalised and are subject to the spending review however it is currently anticipated that the budget for all contracts will be between £101 million and £135 million per annum.   

It is envisaged that the delivery model will encompass those with lived experience and local knowledge to provide a greater understanding of the resources available in the communities There is an acknowledgment that for the delivery of these contracts to be a success there will need to be strong partnership working between the lead delivery partner and their supply chain. This will allow for a flexible service to meet individual needs.

A draft contract specification was shared in March 2025 and provides further details about the suggested delivery model.

Market Engagement

Clinks is working closely with HMPPS to ensure the voluntary sector receives timely information and is able to participate in these competitions. A number of market engagement activities have already taken place. The commercial team are grateful for the feedback they have received and are now in the process of reviewing this and making amendments. To allow for this to take place the next round of market engagement events will take place beginning of July.

Women’s Commissioned Services

The market engagement process is due to start in May. The whole person approach from the men’s services is likely to be used for the women’s services.

The timescales at the moment are:

• Invitation to Tender will go live October 2026;
• contract award date August 2027;
• with the go live date expected to be January 2028.

As with the men’s contracts the MoJ are creating a database of potential interested organisations.

Procurement Act

A new procurement Act came into force in England and Wales on 24 February 2025. This Act aims to simplify the procurement process, making the process simpler for smaller organisations to engage in commissioning opportunities. Further to this, HMPPS will no longer be using the Dynamic Framework to commission services or communicate with the market. For this competition only the lead bidder will be required to register on the new framework. The cabinet office has produced a YouTube video with guidance on how to register.

Clinks will be publishing further information about how the Procurement Act will affect the voluntary sector over the coming weeks.

HMPPS are developing a new database of organisations wishing to be kept informed about the commissioning of CRS contracts, either as a potential lead bidder or supply chain partner. Any interested organisations should complete this Centralised Provider Database Survey.

Any questions or queries you may have can be directed to probation@clinks.org