18.09.13
NPfIT among ‘worst contracting fiascos in history’ – and costs still rising
An influential committee of MPs say the National Programme for IT is continuing to cost taxpayers a fortune two years after it was officially abandoned.
The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) calls the saga one of the “worst and most expensive contracting fiascos” in public sector history, and adds: “Although the Department told us that the National Programme had been dismantled, the component programmes are all continuing, the existing contracts are being honoured and significant costs are still being incurred. The only change from the National Programme that the Department could tell us about was that new governance arrangements were now in place.”
The estimated costs of the scheme rose from £6.4bn to £9.8bn, but ongoing costs arising from legal battles and other issues will keep dragging this figure higher, the MP said, especially the price of terminating the Fujitsu contract in the south of England, and the ongoing costs of Lorenzo in the north, Midlands and east.
Committee member Richard Bacon MP said the fact that only 22 trusts are now expected to take the Lorenzo system – despite the original contracts with CSC totalling £3.1bn – is another indictment.
He said: “Despite the contractor's weak performance, the Department of Health is itself in a weak position in its attempts to renegotiate the contracts.”
He added: “The benefits flowing from the NPfIT to date are extremely disappointing. The Department estimates £3.7bn of benefits to March 2012, just half of the costs incurred. This saga is one of the worst and most expensive contracting fiascos in the history of the public sector.”
He said it also casts doubt on the DH’s 2018 target for achieving a paperless NHS.
The committee said: “Making the NHS paperless will involve further significant investment in IT and business transformation. However, the Department has not even set aside a specific budget for this purpose. As with the National Programme, it will be important to balance the need for standardisation across the NHS with the desire for local ownership and flexibility. The first ‘milestone’ towards the ambition of a paperless NHS is for GP referrals to be paperless by 2015.”
The full PAC report – ‘The dismantled National Programme for IT in the NHS’ – is also based on an evidence session from June, whose witnesses were Sir David Nicholson, chief executive of NHS England; Charlie Massey, director general of external relations at the Department of Health; and Tim Donohoe, senior responsible owner for local service providers at the Department of Health.
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