Probation officers have given a cautious welcome to the Crown
Prosecution Service's (CPS) decision to sign a £200m deal with
Logica to manage its IT services and build a new case management
system.
Harry Fletcher, assistant general secretary of the National
Association of Probation Officers (NAPO), said, "This is an
encouraging development but it is crucial that the CPS, to avoid
repeating previous Home Office IT debacles, should employ civil
service IT specialists to oversee the implementation of the case
management system."
In recent years the Home Office has suffered several serious IT
failures, including those at the Passport Agency, the Probation
Service and the National Immigration Service.
Under the terms of the 10-year contract, Logica will provide an
outsourced service supporting the desktop environment, existing IT
infrastructure and back-office functions.
Logica will also develop the new case management system, which is
due to be completed by the end of 2003, across all the 42 CPS
areas. Development work on an earlier, much-criticised, case
management system was halted in 1998.
Fletcher, however, urged the CPS to liaise closely with users over
the development of the system. He said, "It is absolutely crucial
that it is IT specialists, not civil servants, that run the scheme
and that user focus groups should be referred to at all times."
The criminal justice system has suffered from poor base-level IT
for the past 10 years, he added.
In October 2001 a review by Sir Robin Auld recommended the
dismantling of the Ibis system which links the six main IT systems
used by criminal justice agencies. The review followed a report
from the Public Accounts Committee in August 2000, which found that
IT in the criminal justice system is being developed "from a very
low base".
Logica, however, plans to draw on expertise gained while
constructing case management systems for other government agencies,
such as schools inspectorate Ofsted, in its work with the CPS.
Ros Allen, director of Logica's government division, said, "Over
the past five years we have gained considerable experience in
building mission-critical case management systems."
The company has recently won a series of public sector contracts,
including a £13m SAP implementation at Haringey council in North
London, and a contract to advise the e-envoy on smartcard
strategies.