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Following on from the market engagement notice in late 2024, and a competitive process ending on 28th March 2025. The Home Office now publishes the contract award notice for a Mass Fatality Capability Resilience Storage Framework.

In the event of a major incident resulting in a large number of fatalities which could overwhelm existing body storage capacity the Home Office would provide contingency support to the requesting local authority. The Home Office seeks to replace its current capability with a more efficient operating model. This opportunity will support the Home Offices strategy.

The initial term is 2 years, with the options to extend yearly for up to 2 additional years (2+1+1).

Our vision

We believe a multiple lot framework agreement would be best suited to meet the demands of this capability. Suppliers offering alternative solutions will bid for a place on a capability lot, this will involve suppliers maintaining access to provisions which could be called upon for deployment by the Authority. These aims will be delivered with the responses of this document in mind to ensure that we consider any novel and/or unique approach that could be utilised as a solution.

The scope for this provision is predominantly England, however there is a possibility that the Devolved Administration Governments (Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland) may also enrol.

We will outline the configuration of our core requirement of storage for up to 700 fatalities across three phases (although the authority may adjust the planned fatalities storage of one or more phases to ensure a successful core requirement is delivered). Each phase will be put to the market as separate lots, although we would welcome multiple bids if relevant and the supplier is able to offer a viable to solution to multiple.

Lot 1-Soft Shell:

We plan to have a minimum call-off storage of 100 fatalities for the 'soft shell' portable temporary body storage (including some bariatric). Soft shell may require cover for adverse weather and should be deployable within twenty-four hours.

Lot 2-Hard Shell:

Hard shell may be similar to the existing ISO container body storage units ("hard shell"). The characteristic of this phase is that units should remain versatile and robust to all weather events and may require hard standing. They offer refrigeration and have the ability to freeze. They should provide storage of up to 150 of the deceased (including bariatric). Delivery and assembly should take no longer than three days.

Lot 3-Temporary Building:

The final tier relates to an alternative building/ structure that could be housed outside independently, similar to Nightingale hospitals during the Covid-19 pandemic. They should allow both refrigeration and freezing. The core requirement will be at least 450 fatalities including bariatric and/ or fragmented fatalities. This will need to be deployed within 5 days.