PHW-STA-63444 GAMBLING HARMS PREVENTION COMPETITIVE GRANTS PROGRAMME

Description

Public Health Wales is procuring an experienced external partner to operationalise and administer a two-year, time-limited competitive grants programme for Voluntary, Community, and Social Enterprise (VCSE) organisations. Funded via the statutory gambling levy, this initiative acts as a transitional bridge to sustain essential prevention capacity within the third sector while permanent statutory public health infrastructure is established across Wales. The programme aims to maintain crucial community reach into populations not routinely accessed by statutory services, while generating systematic evidence to inform future commissioning. Public Health Wales retains final decision-making authority over all funding allocations and will issue grant payments directly to successful applicants based on the partner's recommendations.The appointed partner is responsible for the end-to-end operational delivery of the grant lifecycle. Key responsibilities include hosting and maintaining a secure online application portal, distributing marketing materials, managing an Expression of Interest process, and running applicant webinars. The partner will also coordinate the assessment panel by managing scoring, moderation, and conflict-of-interest declarations. Following panel recommendations, the administrator will conduct robust pre-award and post-award due diligence, manage the execution of grant agreements, and handle all applicant communications, including feedback, complaints, and appeals. Ongoing duties involve supporting funded organisations, monitoring six-monthly progress reports, and producing a final programme-level summary report.A strict requirement of this contract is absolute bilingual compliance, meaning all applicant-facing systems, materials, webinars, and communications must be delivered to an equivalent standard in both English and Welsh, fully aligning with the Welsh Government’s statutory Welsh language standards. Additionally, all digital infrastructure must strictly comply with UK GDPR. Funded activities under this programme are restricted entirely to preventative public health interventions—such as public awareness campaigns, targeted high-risk cohort actions, and community outreach—with clinical treatment and crisis response initiatives explicitly excluded from the scope. ## Contract award