The Cabinet Office published Procurement Policy Note 026 on 5 August 2026, and it's done something that's caught a lot of suppliers off guard: it takes carbon reduction out of how central government scores social value in a tender.
If you bid for public sector work, that's the kind of headline that sends the wrong signal. Carbon dropping out of scoring doesn't mean carbon dropping out of the bid pack. PPN 006, the policy note that actually requires your Carbon Reduction Plan, hasn't moved.
What PPN 026 actually changes
PPN 026 replaces the previous social value model for central government contracts, where carbon reduction sat alongside themes like community engagement and staff wellbeing. For procurements commenced on or after 1 January 2027, that gets replaced with two outcomes: Good Jobs and Skills. Nothing else gets scored.
The policy note itself sets minimum weightings of 10% for contracts between £1 million and £5 million, and 20% above that, applied to procurements under the Procurement Act 2023. Environment doesn't get a single mention anywhere in it. Detailed guidance for buyers is due in autumn 2026, so expect more specifics on how contracting authorities apply this over the next few weeks.
The timing isn't a coincidence. Andy Burnham became Prime Minister in July 2026, and his government has been clear about using public spending to back British jobs and British workers. PPN 026 puts that into procurement rules. Good Jobs and Skills are exactly that: fair pay and conditions, training pipelines, and a push to hire people furthest from the labour market, including care leavers and NEETs.
What hasn't changed
PPN 006 is a different document doing a different job, and it's still fully in force. It requires suppliers bidding for in-scope central government contracts worth more than £5 million a year, including VAT, to submit a Carbon Reduction Plan confirming a Net Zero by 2050 commitment, covering five mandatory Scope 3 categories, and signed off by a director or equivalent. None of that is a scoring criterion the way the old social value themes were. It works more like a gate: submit a compliant plan, or your bid doesn't get considered at all.
That distinction matters more than it sounds. Under the old model, strong climate action could earn you social value points on top of meeting PPN 006. Under PPN 026, it can't, not at central government level. Your carbon work stops being something that helps you win on points and stays something that keeps you in the running in the first place. For a supplier deciding where to put effort in a bid, that's a real shift in incentives, even though the CRP requirement on paper reads exactly as it did last year.
It's worth being precise about scope, too. PPN 026 applies to central government departments and their agencies. Plenty of NHS trusts, local authorities and other contracting bodies run their own social value frameworks, and some still score environmental criteria directly. Don't assume a central government policy note has quietly rewritten the rules for a council tender.
What this means for your next bid
If you're prepping a submission for a central government contract starting after 1 January 2027, your win themes probably need rebalancing toward employment and skills content, not away from carbon. If your contract sits above the £5 million-a-year threshold, or your buyer has told you a CRP is required, you still need one, built to the current PPN 006 technical standard, not a shorter version because "carbon isn't scored anymore." A CRP that's out of date, missing a Scope 3 category, or unsigned still gets a bid disqualified, regardless of what's happening with social value weightings elsewhere.
Keep an eye on the autumn 2026 guidance as well. It should clarify how buyers are meant to evaluate Good Jobs and Skills responses, and whether any transitional provisions apply to procurements that were already in flight when PPN 026 landed.
This is exactly the kind of gap that trips suppliers up: a real policy change getting read as a bigger one than it actually is. CarbonVerified keeps its guidance and generated plans aligned to the current PPN 006 technical standard, so a change like this one doesn't leave your CRP behind, whatever else moves around it.
