Houses of Parliament Restoration and Renewal Programme - Dynamic Purchasing System for Collections Conservation Services

The Palace of Westminster is an internationally recognised symbol of the UK and democracy, and part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Extensive, complex work is needed to restore the Palace and as part of planning for restoration, teams are assessing and recording details of thousands of heritage items such as artworks and furniture within the Parliamentary Heritage Collections. The Parliamentary Heritage Collections are the national collection documenting the history, work and people of Parliament and comprise over 26,000 objects. They are made up of the Parliamentary Art Collection, the Historic Furniture and Decorative Art Collections and the Architectural Fabric Collection. Parliament's Heritage Collections teams have overall responsibility for the conservation of these collections, and work closely with the Restoration & Renewal Delivery Authority Ltd (the limited company responsible for delivering the Palace of Westminster restoration and renewal works following necessary decisions from both Houses on the way forward which are expected in 2025). The Delivery Authority and UK Parliament have developed a plan for the establishment of a Dynamic Purchasing System (the DPS) for appointing collections care and conservation specialists to maintain, restore, conserve, and move where necessary Parliament's collections now and during R&R works. Both the Restoration & Renewal Delivery Authority Ltd and the Houses of Parliament will be contracting authorities entitled to use the Collections Conservation Services DPS. The Delivery Authority and Houses of Parliament wish to invite suitably qualified conservators and collection care specialists to register with the Collections Conservation Services DPS to bid for future contract opportunities. This new Collections Conservation Services DPS will be used by the Restoration and Renewal Delivery Authority Ltd to appoint conservators to continue to develop and undertake object assessment activities, to develop object requirements and inform future plans and procedures for either a) removing and storing the collections off site during restoration works, or b) protecting and monitoring them in situ. The Houses of Parliament will use the Collections Conservation Services DPS to procure for the continued core conservation care and maintenance of the collections, where a specialist conservator is required to mobilise and attend the site at short notice. The Collections Conservation Services DPS will be split into twenty Categories of Services. Please refer to Section 2.4 for details. The Delivery Authority and the Houses of Parliament are jointly holding an on-line market information event about their plans for the DPS. Please follow the instructions in Section VI.3 Additional Information to register for the event.