Regional Care Co-operative National Rollout

To apply for grant funding to establish an RCC, the following conditions must be met:

Regional footprint

·       All participating local authorities must fall within a single proposed RCC region

·       Each local authority can only be named in one application

·       Participating local authorities must not already be part of an existing RCC

Alignment with wider public service footprints

·       The government is committed to greater public service boundary alignment as a means to unlocking greater integration and join-up, and as part of this we are aligning key public service boundaries with those of Strategic Authorities

·       Your proposed RCC footprint should therefore align with existing or planned Strategic Authorities where they exist. This is to support joined up working across children’s social care, health, police, youth justice and education

·       Your proposal may span more than one Strategic Authority if this supports the benefits of operating at scale but it must not split a Strategic Authority

Partner support

·       You must have agreement in principle from the relevant police force(s) and key youth justice partners

Additional eligibility depending on your operating model

If you propose a lead local authority model

·       The proposed lead local authority must not have an Ofsted judgement of Requires Improvement (RI) or below (or, for ILACS inspections after April 2026, below RI in any area)

·       DfE may carry out checks to confirm the financial stability of the proposed lead local authority

If you propose a Strategic Authority hosted model

·       You must have written approval from the appropriate lead member(s)Additional requirements for application

Your application must demonstrate:

Leadership and sign-off

·       A senior representative from each participating local authority (for example, the Director of Children’s Services) and each Integrated Care Board (ICB) that operates within the proposed region (for example, the Chief Nurse) has signed the application

·       You can develop full partnership agreements during the Foundation stage

Readiness to deliver at pace

You must show clear evidence of your ability to set up an RCC quickly, including:

·       existing or planned shared data agreements, governance and leadership structures

·       delivery capacity, including staffing and programme management

·       evidence of existing joint working across the region (for example, through partnerships, regional arrangements or shared commissioning)

On behalf of local authorities across a region, RCCs will: 

·       Deliver high quality provision, at a regional or sub regional level, on behalf of all local authorities in the region, including delivering fostering hubs, developing specialist local options to cut reliance on out-of-area care and supporting strategies to recruit, retain and strengthen the children’s home workforce.

·       Ensure a clear understanding of local supply, quality and cost through needs assessment tools, routine data collection and benchmarking to support transparent, collective negotiations with providers to reduce costs and ensure care meet the needs of the children who need them.

·       Share data across local authorities to strengthen market oversight and work collaboratively with regional partners, including integrated care boards (ICBs), youth justice services and police, to secure the most appropriate provision and support for children.

·       Be their own entities and operate on behalf of local authorities under shared accountability, with transparent data reporting.

·       Align regional footprints strategically to enable effective multi-agency collaboration – working with ICBs, youth justice services, police and education partners – to streamline decision‑making, strengthen safeguarding and ensure joined‑up support for children and families.

We expect RCCs to develop three key stages: the Foundation stage, the Development stage and the Delivery stage. Setting minimum requirements for RCCs will ensure consistency and will help to ensure that future RCCs are meeting the policy aims. The Department for Education will monitor delivery and evaluate the impact of the RCCs to inform future rollout.

More detail about the policy objectives and rationale for RCCs can be found in the Regional Care Cooperatives policy statement on GOV.UK.

The application period will open from 26th March 2026 and deadline for submission will be 12:00 noon on 22nd May 2026.

No extensions to the deadline will be given.

To apply for funding, please read the Regional Care Cooperative guidance, before submitting your expression of interest form. 

Please submit your completed expression of interest form (and any requested appendices) via email to Commissioning.CSC@education.gov.uk by noon 22nd May 2026.

Apply to set up your RCC

To apply, fill in the:

• expression of interest form (MS Word Document, 443 KB)

• cost breakdown template (MS Excel Spreadsheet, 30.8 KB)

Send the completed documents to Commissioning.CSC@education.gov.uk.

The deadline for applications is midday on 22 May 2026.

The guidance explains how we will evaluate your application.

We will notify you if your bid has been successful in July 2026.