Government IT projects improving - but several still in doubt

None of the government’s major technology or IT-dependent programmes have received the highest “red” warning status in the latest review of the biggest Whitehall projects.

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However, eight such programmes have received the next highest “amber/red” rating, which means “successful delivery is in doubt”.

The annual report from the Infrastructure and Projects Authority (IPA) shows that 39 IT projects worth £18.6bn are being monitored as part of the government’s major project portfolio – although many of the 40 projects worth £71.1bn classified as “transformation and service delivery” are heavily dependent on IT and digital implementation.

In 2016, two IT projects received a red status, meaning “successful delivery appears to be unachievable” – those were the Home Office’s Oracle enterprise resource planning (ERP) system and the Department for Transport’s (DfT) move to the Cabinet Office’s shared service centre.

This year, the £262m Home Office ERP project has been “reset” – effectively, it has been restarted because of the problems encountered – while the DfT shared services is now rated as “amber” after being re-scoped in August 2016.

The eight IT-related projects rated as amber/red are:

• Two Ministry of Justice projects – the £395m shared services initiative and £2.8bn future IT sourcing programme.
• Two from the Home Office – the £341m digital services at the border, and the £518m national law enforcement data programme which aims to replace the ageing Police National Computer and Police National Database.
• HM Revenue & Customs’ £227m making tax digital for business programme.
• The £168m national data services development programme, and the £720m health and social care network, both at the Department for Health.
• The £1bn Unity project to unify the IT set-up at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra).

Some high-profile projects that have faced recent criticism received more favourable “amber” ratings from the IPA, which means “successful delivery appears feasible but significant issues already exist”, but any problems “appear resolvable”.

Gov.uk Verify – the identity assurance programme run by the Government Digital Service, was rated as “amber/green”.

“The IPA rated the programme’s technical delivery as green, but government’s ability to adopt as amber. The programme has developed a targeted commercial plan to rapidly increase adoption and user volumes in 2017/18. This includes providing a new lower level of identity assurance to support departments’ needs,” said the report.

Computer Weekly has previously asked the Cabinet Office to release details of the Verify roll-out plan under freedom of information (FOI) laws, but our request was turned down. Costs for the Verify programme were also withheld from the IPA report, again citing exemptions under FOI.