What's going wrong with the Government's IT strategy?

The Cabinet Office is set to launch an investigation into failures in a series of recent large-scale IT projects. The study will look at basic principles, asking in particular whether the private investment approach is the right one. It may also examine current projects to see how they can be brought back on track, where necessary.

In the firing line recently has been Siemens Business Systems, following much publicised problems at the Passport Agency over the summer. Siemens had won the contract for a new application processing system and subsequently received much of the criticism for under-performance. In its defence, Siemens has argued that the system was actually designed, developed and delivered on time.

The company's official statement stops short of saying where it believes the blame for problems lies.

As i-FM has already reported, Taskforce 2000 believes the Government's difficulties should have been anticipated. Preparing for Y2K and introducing major new systems at the same time was simply too complex to be problem-free, says the industry-funded millennium watchdog.

Elliott Chase