East Suffolk Leisure Management Contract

Text to be corrected in the original notice: Place of text to be modified: Short description Instead of: East Suffolk Council is seeking to appoint an operator to manage leisure facilities at both Bungay Leisure Centre and Waterlane Leisure Centre (Lowestoft) on the Council's behalf.

The contract will start in August 2020 and expire on 31 March 2029. There will be options at the absolute discretion of the Council to extend the contract period for three periods of up to five years up to 2044. It covers the following facilities:

•Bungay Leisure Centre (which will re-open following refurbishment in August 2020)

•Waterlane Leisure Centre, Lowestoft (which will transfer to the new operator in November 2020). Read: As a consequence of the current coronavirus pandemic, East Suffolk Council (ESC) understands that potential operators are likely to be unable to devote the time and resource to their tender submission. Therefore ESC, in the interest of fairness and transparency, has decided to review the timetable for this procurement and effective today pause the procurement process for two months. At the end of these two months, on Monday 8 June 2020 further information will be given to all prospective tenderers once there is more clarity about the effects of the coronavirus situation. There are three potential options for the procurement which will be considered by ESC with advice from their legal team and in line with the government guidance at the end of the two months pause period. The three options are as follows: 1) a revised procurement timetable will be issued with additional time built in to reflect the fact that prospective tenderers will need to re-engage with the process; or 2) a further pause period will be introduced and communicated to all prospective tenderers; or 3) the procurement will be cancelled and will start from fresh at a later date when it is safe and prudent to do so.

Any clarifications already received but not yet answered, or received during the paused period will be answered if and when the procurement restarts.

ESC hopes that you consider this way forward to be the most sensible option for the procurement at this time, and apologises for any inconvenience caused by this change to the timetable.

Thank you. Other additional information: The contracting authority considers that this contract may be suitable for economic operators that are small or medium enterprises (SMEs). However, any selection of tenderers will be based solely on the criteria set out for the procurement. East Suffolk Council is seeking to appoint an operator to manage leisure facilities at both Bungay Leisure Centre and Waterlane Leisure Centre (Lowestoft) on the Council's behalf.

The contract will start in August 2020 and expire on 31 March 2029. There will be options at the absolute discretion of the Council to extend the contract period for three periods of up to five years up to 2044. It covers the following facilities:

•Bunga