PPN 002’s Social Value Model Missions Explained and Applied: Kickstart Economic Growth

How To Implement The New Social Value Model Missions in your Business

This blog looks at PPN 002 and the Social Value Model published in February 2025. This Model applies only to in-scope contracts published between October 2025 and August 2026, some of those published between February 2025 and October 2025, and some of those published between August 2026 and December 2026. From January 2027, it is superseded by PPN 026.

The PPN 002 Social Value Model has introduced five Missions in place of the five Themes at the heart of the 2021 version. These Social Value Model missions include priorities such as “kickstart economic growth”.

In this series of blogs, we’ll dive deep into each of the Missions to show how your organisation can demonstrate more social value and win more public sector business in the months and years ahead under PPN 002. 

But if you’re ready to explore just what “Kickstart Economic Growth” means for social value, read on!

What are the Social Value Model Missions?

In July 2024, the Labour Party was elected on a platform of “five missions to rebuild Britain” – broad socio-economic goals that it would pursue across the full range of policy areas while in government. 

The five Missions are as follows:

PPN 002 and the Social Value Model launched in February 2025 state in no uncertain terms that central government public procurement needs to promote these Missions by delivering social value. 

How do the Social Value Model Missions Kickstart Economic Growth?

“Kickstart economic growth” is probably the broadest of the five Missions, encompassing as it does three of the eight Policy Outcomes the Social Value Model details:

• 1. Fair work: that offers fair wages and good working conditions: Help people get a job, stay in work, and progress in their careers, with good employment opportunities across the country
• 2. Skills for growth: supporting growth sectors and addressing skills gaps.
• 3. Resilient, innovative and flexible supply chains: Support economic growth through enabling resilient businesses, opportunities for small businesses and voluntary, community and social enterprises

This covers a lot of ground, some of which maps closely onto the old Social Value Model and some of which doesn’t. So let’s break things down further by Outcome. 

Fair Work

This is perhaps the most important Outcome in the whole Model. As a note to the Social Value Model says:

Where there is a large proportion of labour costs in the contract, commercial teams should consider MACs in Outcome 1 as a priority.

Those MACs (Model Award Criteria) are as follows:

• 1a. Create and retain high quality jobs (as defined in MACs 1b-1d)
• 1b Fair working conditions
• 1c. Fair pay practices.
• 1d. In-work progression to help people to move into higher paid work by developing new skills
• 1e. Identifying and managing the risks of modern slavery

With their focus on the quality of jobs created, 1a, 1b, and 1c are new additions to the criteria that contracting authorities should consider when assessing bids. 

1d is functionally equivalent to MAC 6.2 from the old Social Value Model (albeit with a wider scope than simply “disadvantaged or minority groups”). 

1e is the same as MAC 6.3 in the 2021 document. 

Skills for Growth

This Outcome calls for:

• 2a. Learning and skills development opportunities relevant to the contract to address skills gaps

The topic crosses over substantially with the Break Down Barriers to Opportunity Mission and overlaps to a great extent with MAC 6.1 in the old Model – with an added emphasis on addressing skill gaps in key growth sectors.

Resilient, Innovative and Flexible Supply Chains

This Outcome is split into two MACs:

• 3a. Create a diverse supply chain to deliver the contract including new businesses and entrepreneurs, start-ups, SMEs, VCSEs and mutuals Including creating opportunities for entrepreneurship and helping new organisations to grow, supporting economic growth and business creation.
• 3b. Collaborate in co-design and delivery with communities and anchor partners.

These MACs cover everything that was previously included as two Policy Outcomes in the old Model: 

• “Increase supply chain resilience and capacity” under the Tackling Economic Inequality Theme (including five MACs, 3.1, 3.2, 3.3, 3.4, and 3.5)
• “Improve community integration” under the Wellbeing Theme (MACs 8.1 and 8.2)

There is a greater emphasis on combating Modern Slavery in supply chains, which is consistent with this subject’s growing importance in compliance and disclosure regimes and updated guidance on reporting published in March 2025. 

Standard Reporting Metrics

16 of the 33 Standard Reporting Metrics (SRMs) in the new Model apply to this Mission – and 9 of them to Outcome 1. 

• 1ai Number (in roles, not FTE) of employment opportunities created under the contract, by UK region
• 1aii Number of apprenticeship opportunities (Level 2, 3, and 4+) created or retained under the contract, by UK region
• 1bi Number of people working on the contract (aged 16 and above) who have a permanent contract
• 1c1 Number of people (18-20 years) working on the contract who are paid the above the National Minimum Wage
• 1cii Number of people (above 20 years) working on the contract who are paid above the National Living Wage
• 1di Number of person hours of staff in-work progression upskilling delivered through training opportunities and comprehensive upskilling programmes
• 1dii Number of person hours of career support provided to the workforce e.g. mentoring, mock interviews CV advice, or careers guidance
• 1ei Number of tier 1 and 2 suppliers who have been audited/assessed
• 1eii Number of staff who have completed modern slavery training within 90 days of joining the organisation
• 2ai Number of training opportunities (Level 2, 3, and 4+) other than apprentices created or retained under the contract
• 2aii Number of people-hours of learning interventions delivered under the contract, by UK region
• 3ai Direct spend with start-ups: The value of contract opportunities awarded under the contract in £
• 3aii Direct spend with SMEs: The value of contract opportunities awarded under the contract in £
• 3aiii Direct spend with VCSEs: The value of contract opportunities awarded under the contract in £
• 3aiv Direct spend with mutuals: The value of contract opportunities awarded under the contract in £
• 3bi Number of engagement activities with the community, community representatives and or anchor institutions.

SRMs are intended to standardise how various social value measures are reported between authorities and suppliers – resolving a major bone of contention around the old Social Value Model. 

While this is an improvement in many respects, the SRMs as stated are fairly rigid. They don’t allow much nuance, tailoring to specific projects and local needs, or provide scope for the kind of innovation in social value delivery Preliminary Market Engagement is meant to promote. 

That’s why the extensive Guide to the Social Value Model makes it clear that:

“Where the deliverable is not listed in the model list of SRMs or it is not appropriate or proportionate to use one of the SRMs, the authority should agree an appropriate metric with the supplier.”

What You Can Do Now

The PPN 002 Social Value Model is being used concurrently with the PPN06/20 version during 2025:

• Until 30/9/25, contracting authorities can decide which Model to use
• From 1/10/25, the PPN 002 version must be used
• Procurement processes begun or contracts awarded before 24/2/25 (including frameworks) are not affected by the new Model

The clock is ticking, so if you don’t know how to get ready, here are five steps you should take right now:

1. Map Old to New Social Value Model Requirements

If you’re familiar with the old Social Value Model, compare the two to see which Missions and MACs your organisation is best-placed to deliver on. We’ve shown above where old MACs can be more or less closely mapped onto new ones. 

2. Focus on Fair Work

Think in particular about the quality of jobs you might create under public contracts – in terms of pay and working conditions, and opportunities for skills development and advancement. The “Fair Work” Outcome is given special importance as we’ve seen. As it wasn’t covered explicitly in the old Model, there is an opportunity here to stand out by innovating around the creation of high quality jobs and training opportunities in skills shortage areas – which can include fields as diverse as construction and cybersecurity. 

3. Play to Your Strengths

Contracting authorities are being encouraged to build tender requirements around promoting just one Policy Outcome “to focus and streamline the process for suppliers”. You will be able to concentrate the effectiveness of your bids by building your social value offers around the demands of individual Outcomes and their MACs, rather than spreading your efforts out thinly. 

4. Boost your SME/VCSE Spending 

The National Procurement Policy Statement (published at the same time as PPN 002) requires in-scope organisations to set three year targets for direct spend with SMEs (from 1/4/25) and two year targets for VCSEs (from 1/4/26). 

• If you are an SME or VCSE this requirement – along with the explicit ruling out of volume criteria – gives you a meaningful advantage. 
• If you’re not, start diversifying your supply chain to include more of these organisations now. If you don’t know where to start, there are membership bodies such as Social Enterprise UK that offer services and have free online directories to help you identify social enterprises

5. Measure Your Way to Success with Thrive

If you’re not already using the Thrive platform, get a demo today. 

• Thrive is the only social value measurement platform authorised to use the Impact Evaluation Standard, which has been built specifically around the Social Value Model’s requirements and is overseen by an independent Steering Committee of recognised industry experts
• The new Social Value Model prioritises transparent in-contract reporting against social value deliverables. Thrive provides user-friendly, highly customisable tools and dashboards, with the ability to store pictures and context alongside data for better storytelling, and with no extra licence costs or even a need to log in for third parties submitting data for you. It even includes a state-of-the-art report builder for those of you without access to design resources!
• Our detailed case studies from satisfied customers speak for themselves and show the wide range of uses cases – besides winning more public sector business – that our social value module is being put to. 

Quantity and quality of data promises to be key to succeeding with PPN 002. This is yet another step beyond the era of “show them your company policies” towards a true requirement to demonstrate social impact.