Council agrees new deal on adult social care support services

Civica’s contract with the local authority is being extended by at least three years, reports Joe Ives, Local Democracy Reporter

Enfield Council has agreed a new £1.5million contract for the support systems of its adult social care services.

The decision to award a new deal to current providers Civica was officially signed off by Perry Scott, the local authority’s chief executive, earlier this month.

The deal, worth £1,485,709, will see the major international software company continue to deliver the systems used by the council to organise and fulfil its adult social care provision for at least the next three years, with an option to extend for a further two.

Adult social care provides services to people who need extra support due to factors such as age, homelessness or experience of domestic abuse. It delivers services in a number of areas including support for those with mental health and medical conditions or disabilities.

All upper-tier local authorities, including the 32 London borough councils, have a legal obligation to provide these services to residents.

It is one of the largest areas of local authority spending – and one that is becoming steadily more expensive due to factors such as inflation and steadily increasing demand.

Enfield Council’s budget allocation for adult social care in 2026/27 is just under £140m – around 30% more than in the previous financial year.

According to a report prepared ahead of the decision, the digital systems provided by Civica are used to support “the end-to-end management of adult social care activity, including referrals, assessments, care and support planning, commissioning, safeguarding, reviews, and case recording”.

Officers reported: “The system provides a single, authoritative record for service users, supports operational decision-making, performance monitoring, and regulatory reporting, and enables integration with corporate finance and digital systems to support payments, charging, and wider financial control.”

On its website, Civica says it makes software “that helps deliver critical services” for over 100 million citizens and 6,000 public bodies “across the globe”.

The local authority says that, prior to making the contract decision, it “commissioned independent experts” to advise on the merits of continuing to use the company’s systems versus switching to another provider.

Officers highlighted “key risks” of continuing with the current system, including “supplier dependency, ongoing cost pressures, and the need to ensure the system continues to meet evolving service, regulatory, and technical requirements”.

Nevertheless, they concluded that such risks would be mitigated through measures such as contractual protections and performance management, as well as an ongoing review of the system and other market options available.

Civica came out on top “given the time, cost and complexity of implementing a new system and the evolving marketplace for social care systems”. This was in addition to the “delivery risk” and “impact on frontline services during transition”.

The council says its current management system has been “successfully transitioned to a cloud-hosted environment”. The local authority argues this has strengthened security and provided “improved protections for sensitive adult social care data”, while reducing reliance on “ageing on-premise infrastructure”.

The report concluded: “For residents, this decision supports safe, timely, and compliant delivery of adult social care services, ensuring continuity of support for some of the council’s most vulnerable residents, without the disruption that would arise from a system change at this time.”

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