What is it with government and IT projects?

[Kronos]

Yet again the government has wasted £107 million on failed IT projects over a 12 month period. With the biggest loss by the Ministry of Justice who spent £56.3 million on a system designed to save costs on admin tasks such as HR and payroll but decided to outsource to the company that set up the system in the first place.

Authorities in government, councils, the civil service, health boards ETC seem to believe that the cheapest is best and don't seem to have heard of that old adage you get what you pay for. In the real world this is usually true and it is necessary to pay the extra and get something fit for purpose and reliable.

But these people seem to think that wasting money is OK as there is never ever any come back for the many failed decisions made each and every year.

On a personal note through a Freedom of Information request I discovered my own health board has wasted millions on a failed IT system that no one could use,which could not talk to the many other systems installed thought the NHS hospitals covered by my board. Another request discovered that hundreds of thousands of pounds had been spent on over priced consumables such as toner,printer ink, DVD'CD's ETC

 

[Kronos]

I think there are 4 problems which contribute to this.

Firstly, that the tendering process always causes a race to the bottom, with the lowest cost bidder normally winning.

Secondly, they are the lowest bidder because they make claims about what they can achieve for very little but are not realistic about how much this will actually cost.

Thirdly, that staff in government often have no clue about how these systems work and therefore fall for the claims.

And fourthly, because this has gone on for so many years and therefore the new systems are building on old systems which never worked in the first place. This makes it more difficult to make something which actually works, lowers the expectations of staff who are used to having a system which doesn't work properly and means that the system has to be more complex to accommodate the old system.

I'm sure there is more to it but its certainly what I've noticed in the short time I've been working at a large council.

An excellent summary of the issues/problems. Nice one.

 

[Kronos]

Remember that only government projects are publically audited in such a fashion. I've been involved with contracts with private sector companies that have the same difficulties and end up costing the customer a lot more than they thought originally - but these costs normally can be hidden by the time it gets to publish the annual report.

I don't doubt that for a minute but the waste particularly when it comes to my health board can affect services elsewhere so could directly affect me. Where technology plays a major part of our lives organisations such as my health board seem to still be in the dark ages as they obviously do not employ the right people particularly where IT is concerned.

A quick example was I need a copy of my video-fluoroscopy file and was told initially that as it was on a DVD with other patients file then it would contravene the Data Protection act to give me a copy. When that failed they then said that as the file was in a propriety file format I would be unable to open it. Both excuses where bulls doo doos. But obviously they did hot have a knowledgeable IT person to refer the matter to so hence these rather silly excuses both of which would have cost money in time postage ETC telling me in writing as my health board doe not do email again it uses the Data Protection act as the reason.

 

[Kronos]

Some very interesting points have been mentioned here, a bit of an eye opener though when you think about it very logical when it comes to companies keeping schtum when it comes to having goalposts moved on one contract as it might jeopardize future work if they rocked the boat.