Author Archives: ukcampaign4change

SAP an unseen player in Germany’s World Cup win

Posted on 17/07/2014 | 2 comments

By Tony Collins

Brian McKenna of Computer Weekly has written an excellent article which shows the role played by SAP – headquartered in Germany – in the national football team’s victory over Argentina in the World Cup final.

In October 2013, the German Football Association and SAP began collaborating to develop a “Match Insights” software system for the German national team to use in preparation for and during the tournament.

SAP delivered a prototype in March 2014 and Germany’s coach Joachim Low and his management team have been using the software ever since.

During the World Cup, the German team analysed the data captured by video cameras around the pitch and turned it into information that could be viewed on tablet or mobile devices to help improve team performance and gain a deeper insight into its rivals.

The article quotes Oliver Bierhoff, a SAP brand ambassador and off-field manager of the German team,  assisting coach Joachim Low, as saying:

“We had a lot of qualitative data for the opposition available. Jerome Boateng asked to look at the way Cristiano Ronaldo moves in the box, for example. And before the game against France, we saw that the French were very concentrated in the middle but left spaces on the flanks because their full-backs didn’t push up properly. So we targeted those areas.”

There were eight cameras covering each pitch in Brazil and data was available to all the teams – but only the land of Audi, BMW and Mercedes made use of this type of big data analytics, writes McKenna.

Thank you to Dave Orr for drawing my attention to this article.

Brian McKenna’s article 

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Posted in IT successes, SAP

When suppliers over-promise

Posted on 16/07/2014 | Leave a comment

By Tony Collins

Here David Bicknell and I talk about suppliers’ over-promising. It is a radio studio recording for “Chaos Tuesday” . One of the questions is whether some suppliers promise more than they can deliver on purpose or because of a lack of understanding.

In each Chaos Tuesday recording, which is co-hosted by Jim Johnson, guests talk about distinct areas of project management.  Each recording covers one or more of The Standish Group’s 10 chaos factors of success:

Executive Support
User Involvement
Clear Business Objectives
Emotional Maturity
Optimizing Scope
Agile Process
Project Management Expertise
Skilled Resources
Execution
Tools & Infrastructure

Vendors overpromising

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Posted in Campaign4Change

Stop filming! That’s the IBM exit strategy we’re discussing

Posted on 10/07/2014 | 5 comments

By Tony Collins

Dave Orr, a former IT employee at Somerset County Council, is now a local taxpayer trying to see if public statements made aboutthe authority’s joint venture with IBM match up to the facts.

Some councillors don’t seem to welcome his scrutiny, or his campaigning which can attract the attention of the local press.

Somerset claims it is saving millions of pounds through the Southwest One joint venture – which is majority owned by IBM. But Orr has learned through FOI requests and council reports that once extra costs are taken into account the council has had a net loss of £53m on the contract. He points to:

– £52m of SAP and “transformation” costs the council paid upfront to IBM

– £4m of council bid costs

–  £2m for a written-off loan to Avon and Somerset Police for SAP

–  £3m interest on a £30m loan over 10 years

–  £3m in contract management costs

–  £5m in legal costs over a dispute with IBM

This totals £69m. Procurement savings to December 2013 were £16m – which gives a net loss of £53m. The contract is supposed to save £150m over its 10-year life. The deal was signed in 2007 by IBM, Somerset County Council, Taunton Deane Borough Council and Avon and Somerset Police. The authorities are considering what they will do at the end of the contract.

Stop filming

At a meeting of the council’s audit committee last month, the chairman of the audit committee asked Orr to stop filming. He was using a Panasonic compact camera. A vote was proposed and seconded that the meeting not be recorded.

Five councillors voted in favour and 3 Lib-dems abstained. Those supporting the motion to stop filming included Tory, Labour and UKIP members.  Somerset is Conservative controlled.

Orr says the discussion shortly before the vote was taken was on Southwest One and the council’s exit strategy from the contract.  Councillors also agreed that they may at a later date go into a secret “Part 2” session to discuss a “lessons learnt” report about the collaboration with Southwest One.

A blow to local democracy?  

The government has issued guidance that states explicitly that councils should allow the public to film council meetings. Under the heading “Lights, camera, democracy in action” an announcement by local government secretary Eric Pickles  says on the gov.uk website:

“I want to stand up for the rights of journalists and taxpayers to scrutinise and challenge decisions of the state. Data protection rules or health and safety should not be used to suppress reporting or a healthy dose of criticism.

“Modern technology has created a new cadre of bloggers and hyper-local journalists, and councils should open their digital doors and not cling to analogue interpretations of council rules.

“Councillors shouldn’t be shy about the public seeing the good work they do in championing local communities and local interests.”

Before the meeting of the audit committee Orr had obtained informal consent from the council to filming.

Comment

Open government is not a party political issue – none of the parties seem to want it. Indeed councillors at Somerset seem at their most comfortable  when voting for secrecy.  Is this because it gives them a feeling of privilege – having access to information the ordinary citizens don’t have?

In central government one of the first things the civil service does after a general election is give new ministers access to state secrets. It distances the ministers from ordinary people. Ministers feel privileged – “one of us”.  Is this the main unspoken reason some Somerset councillors  love to have secret meetings?

Councillors may feel weighed down by Orr’s questions and campaigning. But his questions are arguably more important than those raised internally by deferential party politicians who don’t ask the most difficult questions.

If anything they should be asking themselves whether they should ask the questions he is asking.

It’s too easy on big outsourcing contracts for supplier and client to put a gloss on the relationship. It’s easier talking about unsubstantiated savings than explaining why the contract isn’t making the savings originally intended. And it’s even easier when you shun scrutiny from members of the public.

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Posted in Campaign4Change, excessive secrecy, IBM, IT-related failures, legal disputes, local democracy, local government, managing change, managing outsourced services, SAP, shared services

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IDS confirms that UC “full” business case not approved

Posted on 09/07/2014 | Leave a comment

Tony Collins

For the first time Iain Duncan Smith has made the distinction between the full business for Universal Credit, which has not been approved, and the strategic outline business case which has been approved.

The truth emerged after a question in the House of Commons this afternoon by Chris Bryant, shadow minister for welfare reform.

On previous occasions when ministers had been asked whether the business case for UC had been approved they replied that the strategic outline business case had been approved. They omitted to say that the full business case, which assures long-term finance for the programme, has not yet been approved.

Now IDS has confirmed to Bryant that approval of the full business case for UC is due “very shortly”. Bryant had asked IDS whether the business case had been approved – yes or no? IDS gave a lengthy reply before answering the question.  He said:

“The Treasury have approved the funding for Universal Credit in 2013, 2014, and 2015 [though not beyond that] in line with the plan I announced in December last year… the final stage in this process, and the logical point is now, has always been to approve and sign off the full business case covering the full, long lifetime of this programme going on beyond this Parliament.

“We are in discussions over that and will eventually bring the £35bn economic benefits to society … and my right honourable friend (in the Treasury) I am certain will approve that very soon.”

Approval of the full business case is far from guaranteed. Withholding consent gives the Cabinet Office, Major Projects Authority and the Treasury a continued say over how the UC programme develops.

Once approval of the full business is given, the centre of government will have less influence over the programme.

Opposition MPs also asked IDS this afternoon whether he would publish the UC business case. He said that no government has previously published business cases but he would consider the matter and discuss it with MPs.

The DWP has not published any of its internal or commissioned UC reports.

Thank you to openness campaigner Dave Orr who drew my attention to the UC debate in the House of Commons today.

Minister did not lie over UC business case – but did officials deliberately mislead?

Millions of pounds of secret DWP reports

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Posted in Campaign4Change, Universal Credit

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Minister didn’t lie over UC business case – but did officials deliberately mislead?

Posted on 09/07/2014 | 1 comment

By Tony Collins

Comment

DWP minister Esther McVey is facing criticism that she misled Parliament by saying that the Universal Credit business case had been approved when it hadn’t.

A close look at the facts shows that the minister spoke the truth, and the DWP officials who wrote her Parliamentary answer also told the truth. But MPs were still misled, perhaps deliberately so.

The officials who wrote the minister’s reply knew that there is an early and very basic business case for Universal Credit,  the strategic outline business case, which had been approved.

All big projects in central government have strategic outline business case approval before they get underway. Universal Credit was the same as any other big programme in this respect.

What hadn’t been approved was the full business case which requires much more detail than the strategic outline case – and it requires plans and costs to be finalised among other things.

When, on 30 June 2014,  Rachel Reeves, Labour’s spokeswoman on work and pensions, asked the government whether the business case for Universal Credit had been approved officials wrote a cleverly deceptive answer.

They wrote that the strategic outline business case had been approved. They did not mention that the full business case had not been approved. It’s certain that the minister did not realise that this answer was deceitful.

That said, the  answer was in line with the DWP’s culture which is to project good news and conceal bad news (NAO report Universal Credit: early progress, September 2013).

This was the original Parliamentary question and answer on 30 June 2014.

Rachel Reeves (Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions; Leeds West, Labour)  

“To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions … whether he has approved the Department for Work and Pensions’ business case for the implementation of universal credit.”

Esther McVey (The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions; Wirral West, Conservative)

“The Chief Secretary to the Treasury has approved the UC Strategic Outline Business Case plans for the remainder of this Parliament (2014-15) as per the ministerial announcement.”

It’s difficult to avoid the conclusion that the DWP, in drafting the minister’s reply to Reeves, intended to mislead.

That’s politics. On the other hand it is an extraordinary misuse of power by senior civil servants.

A strategic outline business case is very different to a full business case.

The strategic outline case merely sets out the strategic context and the case for change, together with the supporting investment objectives for the scheme. It sets out likely funding needs and speculates that the scheme is achievable and meets best practice principles.

The full business case has finalised arrangements including key contractual arrangements , costs,  agreed implementation timescales, main risks, constraints, dependencies, benefits and “dis-benefits”. It sets out an argument on the affordability of the scheme.

The controversy over whether Parliament was misled – which it was – shows the ease with which the senior civil service can protect the government of the day from embarrassment. Except that this time the truth came out; and it came out unexpectedly because a tenacious Margaret Hodge, chairman of the Public Accounts Committee, kept asking civil servants whether the business case for UC had been approved. Eventually, though with some reluctance, they told her the truth.

If a little truth comes out in such an unplanned way, one can only guess at how much other information on the Universal Credit programme is being hidden. Perhaps deliberately so.

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Posted in Campaign4Change, IT-related failures, managing change, openness and transparency, Universal Credit

Treasury refusing to sign off Universal Credit business case?

Posted on 08/07/2014 | Leave a comment

By Tony Collins

Government Computing reports that the business case for the Universal Credit programme has yet to be signed off.

It appears that the Department for Work and Pensions receives money for the programme only when it needs it.

It is odd that the business case remains to be signed although the programme is more than three years old. The programme was “reset” last year.

At a hearing yesterday of the Public Accounts Committee the four top civil servants who appeared before MPs were reluctant to admit that the business case had not been signed off.

They four were:

– Sir Jeremy Heywood, Cabinet Secretary, Cabinet Office;

– Sir Bob Kerslake, Head of the Home Civil Service and Permanent Secretary, Communities and Local Government;

– Richard Heaton, Permanent Secretary, Cabinet Office and

– Sir Nicholas Macpherson, Permanent Secretary, HM Treasury.

Government Computing reports that the four were “reduced to bluster” when the committee’s chair Margaret Hodge  questioned them repeatedly on whether the business case for Universal Credit had been signed off by the Treasury.

She said, “There is no argument about the policy. It is entirely an implementation issue. And I cannot understand a centre that fails to intervene when there is such a classic failure at the departmental level on something that the centre says it is interested in, which is IT.

“It’s supposed to be a digitisation exercise in the way we administer benefits so you can integrate the benefits. What we’ve got out there is not a digitisation – it’s an incredibly staff intensive, pathfinder thing. Why is the centre allowing that to happen? Have you signed off the business case yet?”

“Have you assigned off the business case?” she repeated to  MacPherson.

After some looks between the four permanent secretaries, Kerslake said, “I think we should stop beating about the bush. It hasn’t been signed off. What we’ve had is a set of conditional assurances about progress and the Treasury has released money accordingly. And that’s one of the key controls they have. “

Defending the role of the centre in the Universal Credit programme, Heywood said, “This is an example of where the centre did intervene very strongly, both the Treasury and the Major Projects Authority (MPA).

“The MPA with the support of the Treasury and with a lot of technical help from the Government Digital Service (GDS) has played a very clear role in bringing to the secretary of state’s attention that the project was way off track. And that was a very important intervention from the centre.

“It then followed up with the next technique that the centre has got, which is to provide support in seconding in the then head of the MPA, David Pitchford, to help re-programme the project, a lot of support from Mike Bracken and his team at GDS to help the digital underpinnings of it and also some help on the commercial renegotiation of some of the contracts from Bill Crothers and his team. So it’s a very good example of the assurance role was followed by a support role and that continues.”

Pressed by Margaret Hodge on whether Universal Credit was now on track, Heywood said, “In its current form, yes, I think it is.”

Comment

Among so-called enlightened democracies the UK, perhaps, stands alone. In what other country would the nation’s four most senior civil servants, when asked if the business case for a major project has been signed off, look like children in a playground who are being asked to reveal a secret?

What does it say about open government that the UK’s four most senior civil servants cannot immediately say yes or no to such a basic question?

[One thing it says, perhaps, is that they are all terrified of Iain Duncan Smith who doesn’t like anything being said about Universal Credit that isn’t entirely positive. Worse still, they probably all agree with him.]

Treasury still to fully sign off Universal Credit business case 

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Posted in Agile, Campaign4Change, change management, DWP, excessive secrecy, Government IT, IT-related failures, Major Projects Authority, Universal Credit

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Are passport officials hiding IT problems?

Posted on 08/07/2014 | 2 comments

By Tony Collins

Are Passport Office systems crashing regularly – for up to half a day – without anyone outside knowing?

Last month a Home Office spokesman told Government Computing that IT was “not to blame” for delays in issuing passports.

But yesterday a Passport Office insider gave the opposite impression to Eddie Mair’s BBC R4 “PM” programme. She said that passport systems are sometimes out of action for up to half a day.

It also emerges that the Passport Office’s contract with one of its contractors, Steria, takes into account, in peak periods, the sorts of numbers of applications that offices are receiving – about 150,000 a week.

Home Office minister James Brokenshire told the House of Commons yesterday (7 July 2014) that there have been about 4 million applications so far this year, implying that the number is unexpectedly high.

But 4 million applications is not out of line with Steria’s contractual expectations of up to 150,000 applications a week.

This raises the question of whether the delays are due to a combination of IT problems and high numbers of applications – rather than high numbers alone.

On the BBC “PM” programme the comments by the Passport Office insider were spoken by an actor.  She said the backlog of passport applications has increased since the government announced emergency measures last month.

” The numbers have increased significantly and they are just the ones in the system.  What you need to take into account – and I don’t think people have realised – is that we have another huge backlog of applications that have not been scanned onto the system and are not in process.

“The backlog of applications – what they call “work in progress” – is not a true figure because but you still have another backlog that has not been scanned …”

BBC reporter: So there is another set of passports that don’t appear in official figures?

“That’s correct.”

She said that increasing backlogs are indicated on figures on boards around offices that give dates of which offices are working on what on certain dates.

“Her Majesty’s Passport Office is in total crisis. It’s a total mess …  it is chaos.”

BBC reporter:  A member of my family phoned up to try and make an appointment to sort out a passport last week and while she was on the phone she was told the computer kept crashing. Is that a common problem?

“Yes.  Once the system crashes you cannot issue anything or do anything. You just have to sit there until the technicians or the IT experts reboot the system or put a patch in to get it up and running again.”

BBC: How long does that last? How long are the computers and therefore the people handling the passports out of action for?

“Sometimes I would say a minimum of half an hour up to half a day.”

She said that passports are being stored in meeting and conference rooms which are locked. The windows have been “blacked out or covered with paper so no photos can appear, for instance, in the Guardian“.

She does not believe the Home Secretary Theresa May or her ministers have a grip of the situation. “I don’t think they understand. I am not too sure whether it is because they haven’t been fed the correct information or whether they are just putting their heads in the sand.”

The Home Office said a minister was not available to speak to the BBC.  It provided a statement instead – which gave no response to the insider’s claims of computer problems.

The statement said:

“These allegations are false. We receive thousands of application every week with their numbers constantly changing. We aim to log applications within 48 hours of receipt at which point they become active work in progress…”

Update 18.00 8 July 2014

Paul Pugh, Chief Executive of the Passport Office, appeared before MPs on the Home Affairs Committee this afternoon and was not asked about IT problems and made no mention of any.

He declined to say how many applications have been received by the Passport Office which have not been scanned into the systems. He said the number varied daily. He conveyed a quiet self-confidence which wasn’t in any way dented by committee members who in general did not put him under pressure.

They thanked him repeatedly for dealing with complaints from their constituents.  Committee chairman Keith Vaz handed Pugh 180 emails from people who are facing delays and need a passport urgently.

He denied the Passport Office was in chaos and said the “vast majority” of people working there would disagree with the comments of the anonymous contributor to the BBC “PM” programme.

Comment

The insider’s comments may be relevant given that the Passport Office had serious IT processing difficulties when it has changed its main processing systems in 1989 and 1999.   Has it had a third IT-related calamity as a result of an upgrade of passport systems in 2013?

US-based supplier CSC helped with the upgrade last year but no information has been released on the change-over.  The new system was installed as part of a $570m services contract the Passport Office awarded CSC in 2009.

Steria manages the front-end of passport application processing. It receives applications from the public, scans them digitally, verifies the contents, checksthe scanned documents for accuracy and makes corrections where necessary, and banks payments received. It then passes applications to Her Majesty’s Passport Office to complete the examination.

Steria expected up to 150,000 passport applications a week at peak times and it appears that actual applications have been around this number for much of this year. So why are ministers and officials blaming delays on a record number of applications?

There may be IT problems that nobody in officialdom is mentioning.

The most worrying thing is that they do not have to mention them. Perhaps the cause or causes are complex and they are unsure who bears most of the responsibility.

In politics nobody seems to expect the truth to be told. So it’s likely that ministers and officials will continue to blame the delays in issuing passports on record numbers of applications, and not mention anything to do with IT, except to deny it has anything to do with the backlog.

BBC PM programme (approx 47 minutes into the programme).

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Posted in Campaign4Change, CSC, excessive secrecy, IT-related failures, openness and transparency, outsourcing, Passport Office, Steria

HP’s tacit threat to government not to bid for contracts?

Posted on 03/07/2014 | Leave a comment

By Tony Collins

HP has written to the Treasury  questioning whether it is worthwhile competing for contracts if the Government is no longer interested in doing business with multinationals, says The Independent.

Cabinet Office minister Francis Maude is encouraging departments to spend more with SMEs and be less reliant on a small number of major IT suppliers. He wants departments to avoid signing long-term contracts which lock-in ministers to one major supplier.

The Independent says:

“In a striking case of Goliath accusing David of bullying, the American giants Microsoft and Hewlett Packard have complained that they are being unfairly picked on by the Cabinet Office minister Francis Maude.

“…the Government’s largest IT supplier Hewlett Packard has written to the Treasury to express its concern at plans by Mr Maude to award more Government contracts to smaller suppliers.

“At the same time Microsoft is fighting a rearguard action against the Cabinet Office to protect the million pounds it gets each year from Whitehall by selling popular Office programmes such as Word and Excel.

“Both companies are concerned that they are being singled out by ministers as unpopular and easy targets in their rhetoric about cutting public sector waste…

“Microsoft is attempting to prevent the Government from migrating its own computer systems from those that rely on the multinational to open-source documents that are free to use…

“Both companies look set to be disappointed – at least unless there is a change in Government. Mr Maude is understood to be looking to next year – when a significant number of big IT contracts are up for renewal – to push ahead with the new policy that could significantly denude the profits of IT multinationals.”

A Cabinet Office spokesman said it was unaware of HP’s letter to the Treasury and added: “We value the contribution companies of all sizes make to the UK economy, driving innovation, growth and jobs.”

A spokeswoman for HP told The Independent:  “HP is a proud and long-standing supplier of IT products and services to Her Majesty’s Government and provides vital public services to UK citizens.  We maintain an ongoing dialogue with government about our programme of work.”

A report by the Institute for Government Government Contracting:  Public data, private providers says that HP is the largest supplier to government with earnings in excess of 1.7bn in both 2012 and 2013.

In 2013, 86% (£1.49bn) of HP’s revenue from central government came from a DWP contract to supply infrastructure and systems for DWP and its job centres. “This contract is likely to be the largest single non-defence contract in central government,” says the Institute.

Capgemini, BT and Capita were the next largest suppliers to central government. Capgemini’s work is mainly from HMRC through the “Aspire” contract which is worth about £850m a year.

Departments are more open than they used to be but the Institute found big gaps in the information provided.

These gaps include:

– Contractual transparency –  contracts and contractual terms, including who will bear financial liabilities in the event of failures

– Information about how well contractors perform, allowing a vital assessment of value for money

– Supply chain transparency – information including the proportion of work subcontracted to others, terms of subcontracting (particularly levels of risk transfer), and details on the types of organisation (for example, voluntary and community sector organisations) in the supply chain.

Comment

What concerns Maude and his team is not the existence of major suppliers in central government contracts but the reliance by central departments on long-term contracts that lock-in ministers and lead to costly minor changes.

Nobody wants the major suppliers to stop bidding for contracts. What’s needed is for departments to have the in-house expertise to manage suppliers adroitly, and not to be adroitly managed by their suppliers which seems to be the position at present.

Thank you to openness campaigner Dave Orr for the information he sent me which helped with this article.

The IT giants who fear losing the government’s favour

Opening the door to data transparency

 

 

 

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Posted in BT, Campaign4Change, Capita, DWP, excessive secrecy, Government IT, HMRC, HP, Institute for Government, managing outsourced services, open source, open standards, openness and transparency, supplier relationships

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DWP still spending “significant sums” on Universal Credit scheme, say auditors

Posted on 26/06/2014 | 1 comment

By Tony Collins

The National Audit Office has again qualified the annual accounts of the Department for Work and Pensions.

Amyas Morse, head of the NAO,  says the level of fraud and error at the DWP remains “unacceptably high”. His office published the DWP’s annual report and accounts today.

“The Department’s accounts, and those of predecessor Departments administering this expenditure, have received similar qualified audit opinions since 1988-89.

“Issuing an audit qualification is a serious matter, and the fact that similar qualifications have been in place for such a long period of time does not lessen that seriousness.

“I consider that the overall value of fraud and error in benefit expenditure remains unacceptably high, and the qualification of my audit opinion reflects that.”

On Universal Credit Morse says that the DWP  acknowledges that actions to improve programme management, through the existing IT functionality and the development of the digital end-state solution, and to support new governance arrangements, are on-going and their operational effectiveness is still to be proven.

“It is clear that the Department still has much to do to address all the concerns raised and to ensure it delivers value for money in its implementation of the Universal Credit programme.

“The Department is continuing to spend significant sums in developing the programme, as it both maintains and enhances the existing IT functionality, while simultaneously designing a new digital end-state to replace it.

“The Department will need to exert rigorous control over this expenditure, and ensure it uses the available funding effectively and does not need to impair further assets.” The DWP had written off about £40m on the Universal Credit programme by the time of the NAO’s September 2013 report.

The NAO will publish a new report on the Universal Credit programme before the end of 2014, says Morse.

 NAO plans new report on Universal Credit programme before the 2015 election

Upper Tribunal refuses DWP leave to appeal ruling on Universal Credit reports

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Posted in Campaign4Change, National Audit Office, Universal Credit

NAO plans new report on Universal Credit – before the 2015 election

Posted on 26/06/2014 | Leave a comment

By Tony Collins

Days after the shadow work and pensions secretary Rachel Reeves declared that Labour, if elected, would pause the Universal Credit project and ask the National Audit Office to investigate its progress, the NAO has announced that it will publish a report on the scheme by the end of this Autumn.

The report will probably show whether the programme is on track after its “reset” last year, though IDS may dismiss any NAO criticisms as outdated, as he did after the NAO’s report on Universal Credit.

Much of the Parliamentary debate on whether the Universal Credit “twin-track” IT projects are making genuine progress is starved of fact, so the NAO’s report will be welcomed by all (except perhaps IDS).

The NAO says on its website:

“The NAO is undertaking a second value for money review of the Department for Work and Pensions’ Universal Credit programme. This is a planned follow-up to our first review Universal Credit: early progress, published in September 2013.

“The review will examine the Department’s progress in delivering its twin-track approach of expanding the current service, and developing a digital service that will be capable of delivering the full scope of Universal Credit.”

Below are some of the NAO’s findings in its 2013 report. Its new report is likely to provide an update on whether these problems have been successfully addressed:

–  ineffective departmental oversight

– insufficient challenge of supplier-driven changes in costs

–  inadequate internal challenge of purchase decisions; ministers had insufficient information to assess the value for money of contracts before approving them.

–  insufficient review of contractor performance before making payments

– limited IT capability and ‘intelligent client’ function

–  throughout the programme the Department has lacked a detailed view of how Universal Credit is meant to work

– the Department does not yet know to what extent its new IT systems will support national roll-out

– lack of an agreed, clearly defined and documented scope with each supplier setting out what they should provide.

– lack of transparency and challenge.

– a ‘fortress mentality’ within the programme.

– a ‘good news’ reporting culture that limited open discussion of risks and stifled challenge.

– pathfinder lacks a complete security solution.

– claimants cannot make changes in circumstances online

– need on pathfinders for manual work

– systems are inflexible or over-elaborate

 

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Posted in Campaign4Change