How did Labour screw up so badly on computer systems - the answers simple
Today there are articles asking how Labour managed to blow tens of billions of pounds on dysfunctional computer and IT projects.
The answers are simple, and all the more depressing for it:
- The consultants saw New Labour coming. Some firms that had been banished from government by the Conservative administration saw New Labour as their way back.
- Labour minister wanted to believe in their own narrative and mission to modernise. They were guilty of wishful thinking. As such a sales by the IT industry were easy.
- The government lacked the skills to manage these contracts and kept interfering.
- They lacked any actual knowledge or experience of these types of projects. Anyone who has studies software engineering knows that most public software projects fail - indeed the vast majority.
- And last, but not least, someone else was paying ( the poor tax payer ).
2 comments:
Labour councils in the late 1970's and 1980's were making all the same mistakes at vast cost then. The same people that made them were in government in 1997.
IT companies are geared up to sell in a professional manner. Whitehall doesnt seem to take the trouble to purchase in the same way...after all, if it all goes horibly wrong it's not their money is it?
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