Those targets that the council set are difficult to align to the performance of IT systems.
Along those lines, I am dissapointed that my use of Microsoft software did not give my website #1 organic search rankings, and it let me down hopelessly in my quest to qualify for the Beijing Olympics.
I will be using different software in future, and I'm sure you will be seeing me at a future olympics.

The Council and Micro$oft are creating a new benchmark to "prove" value? Shouldn't it be the other way around?? Isn't this sad???

QUOTE
It would do this with "a new Microsoft 'Value for Local Government' Initiative," by developing "benchmarking methodologies to prove the value of ICT investments".

Steel said Newham and Microsoft were just starting to develop the benchmark.
UNQUOTE

So can I take this as "Newham is employing Microsoft to fix their benchmarks to favour Microsoft"?

How the hell can they get away with these kind of corrupt practices? First they use a Microsoft funded study to "prove" that the Microsoft option was the best one, and excluded competition on this basis, and then they allow Microsoft to set the benchmarks on which Microsoft's performance will be judged.

Why the hell hasn't someone taken Newham to court for using corrupt practices in contravention of EU laws for competitive tendering in local government contracts?

I am begining to think that the "London council unimpressed with Microsoft MOU" title is just a PR stunt to try to deflect criticism about Newhams granting of contracts to Microsoft on the basis of fixed tenders/contracts, and wasting millions of pounds of council taxpayers money in the process.

What We See Today Migrated From Poole of Mainframe less than 4 years past. Government wants to Support What helps its constitutes. Microsoft Has Vastly Improved in Last 4 years, with Self correcting becoming more Real.
Machines can Govern Themselves Once installed better today than ever, outdated contracts simply promote waste, yet trasition to Ultimate is still ways to Kernel Shell, after all, People like to work on what they already know & NOT guess due to New system installed. 
It should Look & Act like same old system they understand so well.
Hardware is just getting to have space to run such complexities with Smoothness Public Demands.
Being Pived about Computing Teams is Root to Improvement. People Love Ultimate & Love Telco that provide Stream, never thinking Government, in Secret Milatary fashion Choose BEST For them All. 
This ALL is Indication of Well informed Council.Yeah.
TS von drashek

And the councils who are ahead of Newham used what vendor's software ... ? Sounds like a no-win for any software source Open or M$. The council telegraphed its intent to transfer blame when they talked about software making a big difference in their ratings. Transfer of blame would have been sillier had the council chosen Open Source, more or less being their own 'vendor', but M$ would have made much of the Open Source 'failure' had the council gone away from M$, hence the title.

I once applied to a job at a special needs school. As part of their ICT plan, advised on by a Microsoft consultant (they had no ICT Technician on site, that was the job I was there for), was complete adoption of the as-yet-unreleased Vista.

This was for a school stuffed full of small-time 3rd-party custom software and hardware. The chance that the majority of it was going to be Vista compatible on any level was pretty low, a view that has been more than reinforced even after a year of Vista buyable existence.

Microsoft will say alot of things to get in the door. Luckily alot of times (and in this case) what they say isn't a really quantifiable discreet value, and that can be used against them. A bit like "Vista Ready".

It's nice to see open source getting a look in, and someone even cancelling a deal (admitting a mistake?) to do so.

Better see a return with the money that would of been spent going somewhere better,

reckon it wont thought they will find some way to make the money that would of gone to nazisoft dissapear somewhere else to never be mentioned