month in review

UK public procurement in April 2025

7,399 UK public sector tenders and contract awards were published in April 2025 by 1,407 buying organisations, 8% up on March 2025. 20.2% of those with a recorded route to market were awarded directly, without competition.

notices

7,399

buyers

1,407

named a winner

6,344

awarded directly

20.2%

median value

£100,000

most active buyers

who won most

biggest changes on March 2025

Change in the number of notices published, against the month before. Measured as an absolute change and shown only where it is at least ten notices — a buyer going from one notice to four is a 300% rise and means nothing.

buyer	March 2025	April 2025	change
Leicester City Council	593	262	-331
UK Research and Innovation	250	153	-97
NHS Cheshire and Merseyside Integrated Care Board	9	86	+77
NHS Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly Integrated Care Board	3	71	+68
Peterborough City Council	7	68	+61
Nottinghamshire County Council	33	90	+57
Nottingham City Council	12	69	+57
The Crown Estate	9	58	+49
NHS Property Services Limited	70	26	-44
Ministry of Justice	22	60	+38

what was bought

the biggest awarded contracts of April 2025

contract	buyer	won by	value
001086 Apprenticeships Round 7	Yorkshire Purchasing Organisation	ACCESS TRAINING (EAST MIDLANDS) LTD +153	£10,000,000,000
Armed Forces Recruiting Service	MINISTRY OF DEFENCE	SERCO LIMITED	£1,326,089,815
Solicitors Services Framework	Llywodraeth Cymru / Welsh Government	ACUITY LAW LIMITED +19	£700,000,000
Belfast City Council Private Sector Partner (PSP)	Belfast City Council	John Graham Construction Ltd	£630,000,000
Specialist Science and Contingency Services (SSCS)	Defra	Fera Science Ltd	£345,710,030
Working Aged Adults Care Homes	Cornwall Council	Bowden Derra Park Ltd +13	£280,000,000
NNC- Treatment & Disposal of Residual Waste and Household Waste Recycling Centres	North Northamptonshire Council	Biffa Waste Services Ltd +1	£255,000,000
Tender for Strategic Partner: Delivery of Residential and Nursing Care in Gloucestershire County Council Estate.	Gloucestershire County Council	Agincare Homes Holdings Limited	£234,000,000
0-19 years (up to 25 years with SEND) Public Health Nursing Service	Lancashire County Council	HCRG Care Services Limited	£212,900,000
Orkney Harbours Masterplan Phase 1 - Scapa Deep Water Quay (SDWQ)	Orkney Islands Council (Harbour Authority)	Acciona Construccion S.A. +1	£200,000,000

Contracts published in April 2025 that name a winning supplier, ranked by the value the buyer published, excluding those flagged as a maximum rather than a price. Figures are as published; gvtcx does not adjust them. A large contract is often a multi-year framework, so the value is what may be spent over its whole life — and where several suppliers share one framework, each is shown against the framework's full value rather than its own share.

how this was counted

Notices published in April 2025 across Contracts Finder, Find a Tender, Public Contracts Scotland and Sell2Wales, under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Counts are of contracting processes, not published notices: a tender and its award notice are one contract and are counted once.

There is no total value on this page, deliberately. Published values repeat a framework's entire ceiling against every supplier on it, so a month containing one large framework would read as a spending spike that never happened. The median excludes anything flagged as a ceiling, and the reasoning is set out in full here. Where a total IS defensible — contracts awarded to a single supplier, with no framework — it is on the direct awards page.

A month stays open to revision: publishers backdate, so figures for the current month and the one before it may still move.