The procurement is being run by a single east London council but is open to contracting authorities across Greater London, East Anglia and the home counties.

This means the four-year framework could have an estimated value of up to £800m, giving it the potential to become the biggest local authority modular building programme in the country.

Procurement chiefs at the London Borough of Barking and Dagenham have split the framework into four lots – standard modular units for purchase or hire, and bespoke modular buildings worth up to £3.5m and over £3.5m.

Nine months ago the council awarded a major school building framework for a group of east London councils after they decided to shun the Education and Skills Funding Agency’s framework.

The move into modular building system comes after the ESFA revealled last week it had picked Caledonian and Styles & Woods to pilot the first 16 offsite primary schools under the second wave of the Priority School Building Programme.

The Council will be running the tender process through its e-tendering portal, with PQQs completed by 29 September.

The framework will be available for use by public sector contracting authorities in the Greater London area as well as contracting authorities located in the counties of Essex, Hertfordshire, Suffolk, Norfolk, Cambridgeshire, Northamptonshire, Bedfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire, Berkshire, Surrey and Kent.