Whitehall cost-saving computer loses millions
A DEPARTMENT FOR TRANSPORT 'cost-cutting' computer system has left taxpayers having to spend more after it started to talk German.
A report from MPs slammed the department for 'stupendous incompetence' in its management of a scheme to save £57million in administration costs.
The new computer issued messages in German, wrongly recorded that staff were off sick and randomly confiscated staff holidays.
The project went wrong because the department was advised by its consultants that it could be up and running within one year if it built shared services on existing systems in the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency. Instead of going out to tender, it used an existing contract with IBM. This meant that other companies were not given the chance to come up with a better set-up.
Edward Leigh, the Conservative MP who chairs the public accounts committee, said the project was among the worst his committee had ever examined and laid the blame with senior officials in the department.
The programme was based in the DVLA's Swansea office. It was supposed to manage human resources, payroll, and finance support for the department. It cost £55million and produce £112million of savings.
However now it looks like it will cost £121million and produce savings of just £40million.
Liberal Democrat transport spokesman Norman Baker said the underlying computer system was inadequately procured and tested and that when it was switched on it was unstable. µ
L'Inq
Daily Mail
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It's a commentary on the innocence of the public that people are surprised when this happens. Think about it for a few moments. What does a bureaucrat really, really want? Obviously, more money and power, and less accountability. Now, the more he undertakes to deliver, the greater his accountability; so that's generally ruled out. But the more staff he has, and the bigger his budget grows, the better. So he ideally is looking for constant (or shrinking) output with steadily growing resources.
Now, what's the standard definition of "efficiency" again? Oh yes, it's exactly the opposite of what our bureaucrat wants. So how can we pretend to be surprised when they take vast amounts of our (taxpayers') money, and repeatedly accomplish nothing (or less than nothing) with it? It's not their aim to accomplish anything - it's their aim to hold down a cushy, well-paid, prestigious job for as long as possible and then retire with a massive, rock-solid pension paid for by our taxes.
Alles klar?
The system cost £121m, and generated £40m in savings. Surely this is a wild success when compared to other large government IT projects, most of which cost hundreds of millions and never go live, generally being cancelled and brushed under the carpet. Well done IBM, at least you only blew £121m of our money.
What we need here is an enquiry costing more millions into why the new system was merely a disaster and not a catastrophe. Once we have had that nailed down we can apply the knowledge to other government IT catastrophes, hopefully improving them to the point where they are "completely useless".
Perhaps its time to have another crack at the intelligence sharing system:
http://www.computing.co.uk/computing/news/2237998/whitehall-intelligence-sharing