GLRO24-11 Facilities Management and Support Services at City Hall for the Mayor of London and London Assembly Elections in May 2024

1.1.    The Mayor of London and London Assembly Elections will take place on Thursday 2 May 2024. 

1.2.    It is expected that the results for both the Mayor of London and London Assembly elections will be declared on the evening of Saturday 4 May, possibly going into the early hours of Sunday. Should a  General Election also be held on Thursday 2 May, then the results of the GLA elections will be declared on Sunday 5 May, possibly going into the early hours of Monday 6 May (a bank holiday). Planning for both eventualities is taking place. Costs will be higher if the results are not announced until the Sunday or Monday, as higher overtime rates will apply.

1.3.    The counting of the votes will be undertaken manually. The results will be communicated to the central hub at City Hall, from where the elections will be coordinated.

1.4.    The results for the elections of Mayor of London and London-wide Assembly Members will be declared at City Hall, while the declarations for the Constituency Assembly Members will be made in the nine count centres across London by Constituency Returning Officers.

1.5.    The GLA Facilities Management Unit has been commissioned to provide enabling works and production support to the elections at City Hall. This includes services such as: space planning; broadcasting the results from City Hall via a pool feed; security; business continuity planning; catering; cleaning; porterage; and any other ancillary and logistics services as may be necessary to support the announcement of the results. 

1.6.    Election management software needs to be developed to support the specific requirements of the elections, as detailed in GLRO 24-04 (26 January 2023). Initial approval for this procurement was granted in GLRO 24-04 for £210,000. This was then competitively tendered and, following the procurement exercise, an additional £40,000 is now needed to meet the contractual requirement. A further £50,000 is required for approval to conduct assurance activities – namely functional testing, performance testing, penetration testing and accessibility testing. In total, an additional £90,000 is required for IT requirements related to election software.
 

2.1.    The objective of this expenditure is to ensure the efficient delivery of the election results at City Hall. 

2.2.    This is the first time that the election results will be announced from the new City Hall. As such there will be some differences in the services required, as the configuration and nature of the building are different to the old City Hall. Furthermore, some of the costs (particularly labour) will not fully be known until after the event. For instance, should the results be announced on the Sunday, the labour costs will be higher than on a Saturday, as enhanced overtime rates will apply.

2.3.    The FM unit event production costs will include:

•    a fee from the production company for providing consultancy, materials and supplies such as signage and furniture; and equipment hire (estimated at £50,000)
•    security staff and equipment (estimated at £60,000)
•    accreditation and supporting materials (estimated at £10,000)
•    FM staffing costs (estimated at up to £20,000)
•    broadcasting and audio-visual services (estimated at up to £100,000)
•    support and infrastructure for media (estimated at £20,000)
•    catering for elections staff working extended hours (estimated at up to £15,000)
•    cleaning (estimated at up to £10,000)
•    logistics and porterage support (estimated at up to £12,000)
•    engineering and maintenance support (estimated at up to £50,000)
•    business continuity arrangements (estimated at up to £10,000)
•    BSL interpreters (estimated at up to £12,000)
•    contingency to cover other miscellaneous elections-related expenditure of £300,000; this includes a provision for COVID-secure or other last-minute measures should they become a requirement at the time of the elections.

2.4.    These services will be procured in a variety of ways, depending on which is the most advantageous. This will include purchasing: 

•    through the GLA’s existing contracted providers
•    through the event production company 
•    directly by the GLA. 

2.5.    The final costs for this will only be known after the election, when final accounts are submitted. 

2.6.    A further approval will be sought should the combined estimated expenditure on the production requirements exceed £670,000.
 

3.1.    City Hall is designed as an accessible venue, and the venue set-up and operation will incorporate accessibility requirements into the design. 

3.2.    There are no other equality considerations arising from this decision.
 

4.1.    This decision requests approval of £760,000 for the following:

•    £670,000 for election production costs and enabling works at City Hall
•    an additional £90,000 for elections software due to increased procurement costs and additional testing required.

4.2.    The majority of expenditure is expected to be incurred in 2024-25. The planned budget for these two elements was £940,000, against projected costs of £970,000. This overall elections budget is sufficient to meet the £30,000 overspend.
 

5.1.    The approvals sought by this decision are within the scope of the GLRO’s statutory powers.