PPN 002’s Social Value Model Missions Explained: Take Back Our Streets

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 From January 2027, it is superseded by PPN 026.

In February 2025, PPN 002 was published, introducing a new Social Value Model based on Missions rather than Themes. Among these Social Value Model missions, “Take back our streets” aims to emphasise community empowerment and safe public spaces.

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. 

“Take Back Our Streets” differs from the other Social Value Model Missions in that there is no obvious analogous Theme in the old Model. The focus on crime reduction is new, and it makes a whole range of previously unexplored social value outcomes admissible in public procurement bids. 

But first, let’s take a quick look at the bigger picture. 

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 Help Take Back Our Streets?

It’s clear that there is only so much that public procurement can do to reduce crime and fear of crime. But the way that public money is spent can have a more or less indirect impact. Hence, only one Policy Outcome is tied to this Mission:

Support the reduction in crime through community cohesion, awareness raising and action.

This, in turn, is made operational through a single Model Award Criteria (MAC):

• 5a. Influence staff, suppliers, customers and communities through the delivery of the contract to support the reduction in domestic abuse

More detail is provided in the Model Sub Criteria. Contracting authorities should be looking for policies and practices put in place mitigate and manage risks of domestic abuse in the contract workforce, including:

• Safeguarding plans and processes in place
• Working with local or national charities and community organisations to address the risks of domestic abuse
• Means of influencing staff, suppliers, customers, communities and any other appropriate stakeholders with respect to the risks of domestic abuse relating to the contract workforce

Standard Reporting Metrics

Only one Standard Reporting Metric is listed in relation to Taking Back Our Streets:

• 5ai. Number of hours of learning interventions delivered under the contract raising awareness on the risk of domestic abuse.

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 SVM. 

However, this metric as worded doesn’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. Indeed, this Mission looks very restrictive at first glance. 

But 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. 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. 

Conversely, it has often been claimed that the earlier public procurement systems had a tendency to discriminate against specialist providers of domestic violence support services and refuges by prioritising low cost options.The emphasis on domestic violence reduction as a goal of social value policy could be interpreted as a way of redressing that imbalance by giving greater weighting to the expertise that specialists can bring to this space. 

2. Focus on Education

The inclusion of SRM 5a is a very clear signal that the government is putting a priority on educational work in social value. Look for opportunities to:

• Organise community events in areas affected by your works to raise awareness about domestic violence risks
• Provide training opportunities for employees and contract workforces to enable them to make a difference
• Tighten up and explain your own procurement policies, to encourage your supply chain to prioritise domestic violence reduction
• Organisations can sign up to the Employers Domestic Abuse Covenant

3. Think Creatively

Of course, There are ways to “support the reduction in crime through community cohesion, awareness raising and action” that don’t relate to domestic violence but which nevertheless generate social value. The provision for alternative metrics mentioned in the last section gives scope for other kinds of community-focused crime prevention initiatives, such as: 

• Better environmental design (improve street lighting, cleaning up graffiti, landscaping that deters crime)
• Deployment of crime prevention technology and target hardening (CCTV, reporting hotlines, improved locks, more secure windows)
• After-school programme provision for at-risk young people
• Funding or supporting police-community partnerships
• Initiatives to combat loneliness and isolation help to give confidence and reassurance to actual and potential victims of crime

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 customizable 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.