Public Sector IT

UK Government's love of IT complexity

2010-03-10T09:40:00.001+00:00

@tonyrcollins has been posting quotes on his blog from the BBC Radio4 File on Four programme about IT public sector projects in the UK, including the IT problems hurting farmers.

So where is that podcast? I'm sure I must have already downloaded it ...

The programme opens with a comment by Edward Leigh, the retiring chairman of the House of Commons’ Public Accounts Committee.

"We the taxpayer are paying enormous sums to people for these IT projects, to run them for us, and to waste money for us. So I think once a general election is over whoever wins I hope will take a scythe through all these precious IT systems."

Here is Dr Phyllis Starkey MP, chair of the parliamentary select committee, talking about a failed system for the fire service.

"There have clearly been massive mistakes about the way in which the project was first formulated and the way in which the contract was originally drawn up with the main contractor and they've led to huge delays and massive additional costs to government and to the various fire authorities."

Aha, I just got to the bit where Tony Collins himself appears on the programme. For those of you that don't know him, Tony is the executive editor at Computer Weekly and has been a public observer and critic of public sector IT in the UK for a long time. Very sound.

I was particularly interested in Edward Leigh's suggestion that ministers are subject to the illusion that it is easy to add functionality.

"They’re very short-termist. They want to create a quick impact …[and] are very naive about IT systems and the cost of IT staff, so they’re taken for a ride by very bright people who earn very large salaries in the private sector running these companies."

“Ministers come they go and they add onto these things like a Christmas tree. You need one simple – piloted – [system] … you stick to it. Rough-justice politicians just keep changing their minds – constantly new ideas – and of course they are just playthings for the private sector."

But will anything change after the election? Tony Collins sounds a note of caution: A few big IT suppliers may have Tories over a barrel. So more of the same then?

Generous to a fault

2010-02-24T00:06:00.000+00:00

CSC Chief Executive positive about NPfIT despite "political rhetoric", reports Tony Collins (Computer Weekly, Feb 2010)

CSC boss says "we are going to work something out that satisfies their needs as well as ours". How very generous of him.

Procurement and Risk

2009-01-15T20:12:00.004+00:00

The Parliamentary Public Accounts Committee (PAC) has published some (mild) criticism of the Defence Information Infrastructure project, contracted to EDS by the UK Ministry of Defence [Report (pdf) via The Register].

"The Ministry ... says that there's no need to worry about the risk budget being two-thirds gone at this point as it is normal for emergencies to appear early rather than late in a project."

But that of course depends how risk is managed. One possible approach is to try and eliminate or reduce uncertainty early in a project, before expensive commitments are made. However, the PAC has identified some outstanding risks.

The longer it takes to complete the implementation of DII, the greater the risk that one or more of the Department’s legacy systems will fail.

The Department did not conduct a pilot before commencing full implementation, even though the DII Programme was complex and the timetable ambitious.

The continued presence of this kind of risk in the programme suggests that "emergencies appear early" looks like an optimistic hope rather than a management achievement.

Note: Last summer, the DII received qualified praise from the National Audit Office [The Register, July 2008]. The NAO has itself been subject to criticism for its cosy relationship with large contractors such as EDS, especially under its former comptroller Sir John Bourn [Private Eye, Guardian].

Louise Ferguson

2005-01-04T02:49:00.000+00:00

Blogging in November 2004, Louise Ferguson writes

This has not been a good year for major public sector IT projects.

She lists several of the failures, and identifies two common threads.

An attitude of 'we know best' on the part of senior decision makers, leading to unwarranted assumptions about how people work, erroneous requirements specifications, and finally systems that are not fit for purpose.
A belief that IT, merely through its existence, changes business processes and people's behaviour.

CSA Fiasco 2

2004-12-31T01:05:00.001+00:00

I have written a brief analysis of the CSA Fiasco, together with Philip Boxer, which illustrates some of Philip's ideas about complex system design. This is still in draft form, and we are keen to get suggestions - does this make sense? how can we improve the document? how can we use this material to develop commercial opportunities?

Public Sector IT - The CSA Case

CSA Fiasco

2004-11-19T09:37:00.000+00:00

At the UK Child Support Agency (CSA), an IT system costing £456m is widely expected to be scrapped, following the resignation of CSA boss Doug Smith. On top of the cost of the IT system itself, the CSA has had to write off over £1bn of debt. In addition, there is incalculable cost to other stakeholders - in particular, the CSA's "customers".

According to some sources, contractor EDS has already conducted its own postmortem, describing its own system as "badly designed, badly delivered, badly tested and badly implemented".

CSA Boss Quits	ePolitix.com, TheRegister
Government Under Pressure	ePolitix.com, Guardian Unlimited
EDS	ePolitix.com,
Commercial Secrecy	TheRegister
Waste of Public Money	TheRegister

Defence Information Infrastructure

2004-11-08T09:11:00.000+00:00

The UK Ministry of Defence is about to sign what is thought to be the largest IT contract in Europe - a ten year contract addressing the needs of nearly a third of a million users at 2,000 locations. This involves a major development programme over the first three years, building and installing a single system to replace a diverse set of legacy systems, due to be fully operational by the end of 2008. This is to be followed by a seven year support programme.

MOD link

DII is not the largest public sector IT programme in the UK. The NPfIT is considerably larger, but is split into several procurement contracts. But DII is the largest public sector IT programme to be assigned in a single contract.

The MOD currently spends around £600m a year on IT. The development programme is supposed to cut this bill by 20%. 2000 civil servant jobs will be shifted to the successful bidder.

At present, there are two rival consortia in the frame:

Consortium	Leader	Led
"Atlas"	EDS	Fujitsu, General Dynamics
"Radii"	CSC	BT, Thales

The winner will be announced in February 2005.

EMIS versus NPfIT

2004-10-01T01:24:00.000+01:00

According to the EMIS-Online website

EMIS is the largest IT supplier in the Primary health care market, hosting over 39,000,000 Electronic Patient Records within its systems. EMIS is an innovative IT provider delivering comprehensive solutions and services to the NHS Primary health care market. Our corporate policies ensure realistic and objective appraisal of Primary health care computing both for present and future needs, whilst fully supporting current and future NHS strategies.

EMIS is under threat from the National Programme for IT in the NHS (NPfIT). As we see from several articles in Computer Weekly, Manpreet Pujara, chairman of the EMIS User Group, is one of the NPfIT's most vocal critics. A letter dated August 23rd, from Dr Pujara to the EMIS user group membership, is published on the EMIS corporate website (pdf).

So why is this conflict interesting to anyone other than those directly involved? Legacy systems are decommissioned all the time; stakeholders with a vested interest in the old technology put up a spirited defence; users loyal to the legacy vendors display resistance to change.

Computer Weekly is paying attention to this conflict for several reasons. Firstly, it has many readers who are directly involved in IT for the NHS. Secondly, its UK readers are interested in the NHS both as consumers and as taxpayers/voters.

But there is are some general principles at stake as well. The NpfIT seems to be a classic example of large public sector IT. And that's the main reason we are discussing this here.

What are the characteristic features of large public sector IT
How does NPfIT manifest these features?

Trevor's critique is in three parts: diagnosis (making sense of what is going on), prognosis (predicting what is going to go wrong) and prescription (sketching an intervention that would get things back on track).

BCS Meeting

2004-09-13T03:30:00.000+01:00

The following meeting might be interesting ...

title : Managing Programmes in the Public Eye

speaker : Chris Loughran, Deloitte

venue : IEE, Savoy Place, London

date : Thursday 28th October 2004

"Government IT programmes are amongst the most complex and demanding. Success may pass unnoticed but failure can be all too public - remember the long queues at Passport Offices and the delayed tax credit payments? These programmes affect the lives of many UK citizens and place special demands on the IT professionals that manage them. Our speakers will draw on their experiences working on major government programmes to share lessons they have learnt that are relevant to all project managers."

Further details from BCS website

Stakeholders?

2004-07-27T01:31:00.000+01:00

May 2004

The £6bn programme to revolutionise the NHS's IT is under fire for failing to communicate with doctors and clinical staff who will have to work with the new systems.
The row erupted last week after the surprise resignation of one of Britain's top doctors, Professor Peter Hutton, chairman of the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges, from the programme's advisory board.

Guardian Unlimited, May 6 2004

July 2004

The Department of Health (DoH) has set up a body to represent the interest of patients in the NHS National Programme for IT (NPfIT).

The Register, July 9, 2004

Patients and doctors will be able to have their say on the new £5bn NHS National Programme for IT.

ZDnet, July 6, 2004

Journalists always focus on what they find surprising about the story. Perhaps it is unusual that patients are being consulted. Perhaps it is even unusual to consult doctors. But it was the doctors whose representatives walked out of the previous body.

title :	Managing Programmes in the Public Eye
speaker :	Chris Loughran, Deloitte
venue :	IEE, Savoy Place, London
date :	Thursday 28th October 2004