North Yorkshire Council (NYC) and Humber and North Yorkshire NHS Integrated Care Board (ICB) is seeking a supplier, or a consortium of suppliers, through a competitive grant process, to deliver capacity building (infrastructure) and support to North Yorkshire’s Voluntary Community and Social Enterprise (VCSE) sector.

The grant recipient would provide support which includes the provision of funding advice; training for staff, volunteers and trustees; support for new groups in setting up; voice and representation; and networking activities among many others. This helps to ensure we have a robust, effective and quality VCSE sector across North Yorkshire.

Please note: This opportunity is to provide VCSE infrastructure support across North Yorkshire, not including York, which is delivered by York CVS.
The grant start date will be 1 April 2025 and the grant recipient will be expected to meet the following criteria:

• The supplier (or lead supplier) must be a not-for-profit organisation
• Must be able to deliver support to VCSE organisations across the full North Yorkshire Council boundary.

The current agreement for the provision of this infrastructure support service will finish on 31 March 2025. Therefore, this is prior notice that a competitive grant process will be run to identify a provider for this service. The new agreement will start on 1 April 2025 and will be in place for three years with the option to extend for an additional 2 years (maximum 5 years). The opportunity is expected to be published in late-September/early-October 2024.

Attend the information webinar on 5 September to find out more

The commissioning team will be holding a webinar to provide some additional information about this service and how to submit a response. The purpose of this webinar is to provide organisations, that are interested in delivering infrastructure support, information about the requirements of the grant with some hints and tips on how to submit a response to the competitive grant process. The details of the webinar are as follows:

Date: Thursday 5 September 2024
Time: 2pm – 3pm
Where: Microsoft Teams

If you are interested in attending the webinar, you’ll need to register on the YORtender portal and search for Quote/Tender 88523 – Voluntary Community and Social Enterprise (VCSE) Sector Infrastructure Support Grant – Market Engagement Webinar.

There will be a registration form within the ‘Documents’ area of YORtender, please complete the form and return through YORtender no later than 3pm on Wednesday 4 September. Dial in details for the Webinar on Microsoft Teams will be sent out via email when registration closes. Please note, attendance at the webinar will be capped at 2 people per organisation.

Additional information

The webinar is an engagement exercise; any subsequent opportunity will be advertised separately and all organisations wanting to participate will need to respond as and when it is published.

The grant opportunity and all associated documents will be published on YORtender. You can use the following link to register: Supplier registration (eu-supply.com). If you require any assistance with registering/returning a submission, please contact Mercell via email on
uksupport@eu-supply.com or 0800 840 2050 (Monday – Friday, 9am – 5pm).