One of Whitehall's biggest IT projects, the Defence Information
Infrastructure (DII), is to cost £4.5bn more than parliament was
told in 2006.
The difference between the announced cost in 2006 of £2.3bn and
the new figure of £7.09bn is because the Ministry of Defence, the
department responsible for DII, did not disclose the whole-life
programme costs.
The full figures have been released for the first time because
of a
report published today by public spending watchdog the National
Audit Office.
MP Richard Bacon of the Public Accounts Committee criticised the
MoD, and will question officials at a forthcoming hearing on the
DII.
Partial estimate
Although the National Audit Office found that the MoD had the
costs of its DII contracts with the Atlas consortium, led by EDS,
under firm control, the Atlas contracts represent only a part of
the total expected cost of the DII.
The DII project also has to finance DII-related programmes such
as wide-area support services, funds set aside to manage future
risks, and work not yet contracted for (for example, to supply
systems at 'top secret' security level).
None of this was explained to parliament. The MoD gave only the
contract costs of the initial phase of the DII even though it had
known for a year before that the projected total cost of the DII
would be at least £5.8bn.
The £5.8bn figure has subsequently risen to £7bn, in part to pay
for "additional capabilities for the deployed environment which
were not in the original scope of DII".
Concealment
The concealment of the full expected cost of the DII contract
shows how difficult it is for parliament to get clear and open
answers to even simple questions about Whitehall's most high-risk
IT projects and programmes.
Computer Weekly has campaigned for the publication of Gateway
reviews - independent internal assessments of IT projects - to shed
light on the progress of risky programmes, but the government has
gone to the High Court to keep them secret.
The DII is designed to replace more than 300 different legacy
systems used by the armed services. The aim is to deliver 150,000
terminals to 300,000 users at 2,000 sites, including ships and
submarines, and front-line forces in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Serious delays
The NAO said: "The DII has delivered important benefits, but has
run into implementation difficulties, and key elements are running
significantly late.
"When planning the system, the MoD did considerable work to
understand and mitigate risk, by learning from other large computer
projects, and devised robust commercial, governance and
decision-making structures.
"The programme has delivered a number of improvements to the
existing IT systems within the MoD, such as improved user support
and reliability. Where DII has been introduced, it has generally
been available when it should be.
"The programme has also helped the department develop and
install at short notice two systems supporting front-line troops on
operations in Afghanistan. But, throughout 2005 and early 2006,
problems emerged with two key elements of the programme: the
roll-out of hardware and the creation of software.
"62,800 computer terminals were due to be in place at permanent
defence sites by the end of July 2007. At the end of April 2008,
only 29,000 had been delivered. The completion date for the
installation of the first increment of the programme is 18 months
late."
A big ask
Tim Burr, head of the National Audit Office, said, "It was
always going to be a demanding task for the Ministry of Defence to
replace its diverse information technology with a single,
high-quality system."
He added, "The programme has run into difficulties and further
concerted action will be needed to increase the rate of roll-out of
terminals and to deliver the remaining software."
The MoD has paid EDS less than originally expected because of
the roll-out delays. Payments to Atlas are based largely on the
rate at which DII terminals are rolled out.
See
also:
MoD DII Project could cost £7bn on
Tony Collins'
IT Projects Blog
DII: progress, problems and lessons >>
DII hits major problems >>
£5bn DII plan too ambitious? >>
Do Gateway reviews produce results? >>