Lee Valley Regional Park – Procurement Support

SLC were appointed in 2018 to provide procurement support on behalf of Lee Valley Regional Park Authority for its iconic sporting venues. Located within a 10,000-acre park, the six facilities are the Lee Valley VeloPark, Lee Valley White Water Centre, Lee Valley Hockey and Tennis Centre, Lee Valley Athletics Centre, Lee Valley Riding Centre, and the new £30m Lee Valley Ice Centre, which opened in 2022.

At the time of this procurement SLC were working with Sport England on the Leisure Services Delivery Guidance and were able to apply the very latest approaches the leisure procurement.

Due to the specialist nature of the facilities a very bespoke Services Specification was needed to accommodate usage from elite athletes with community use and events and a high provision for maintenance and lifecycle replacement. Similarly a bespoke suite of performance indicators was developed to enable the Authority to monitor the progress of the operator against its key priorities.

The procurement also included a new ice centre to replace the ageing existing facility and an investment fund to enable the new operator to upgrade and improve facilities.

The Council adopted a Competitive Procedure with Negotiation (CPN) procurement and took a bold decision to weight the procurement evaluation 70:30 in favour of quality.

In late 2019, following a rigorous evaluation of all bids the Authority selected GLL as its preferred operator partner. Negotiations were brought to halt with the advent of the global pandemic and as a result the Authority brought the services back in-house on a temporary basis until the impact of the pandemic subsided.

In 2021 the Authority resumed its negotiations with GLL and the new contract commenced in April 2022. The contract has provision for further investment into the facilities in addition to the new ice centre to ensure the venues stay relevant and best in class.

TESTIMONIAL