The Home Office is to spend £5.2 million on exiting a legacy contract for the troubled Emergency Services Mobile Communications Programme (ESMCP).
It has published an award notice for a contract with Deloitte to carry out the work on exit and transition until the end of September, stating that it covers support for a controlled handover to a new technology delivery partner.
The contract for the new role, valued at up to £71 million, was awarded to CGI in April.
This follows a stream of problems and delays in the programme, which covers a number of projects including the delivery of the Emergency Services Network (ESN).
According to the new notice Deloitte, which has been providing delivery and advisory services to the programme since 2019, will be responsible for ensuring new timescales are not jeopardised. Specific areas to be support include procurement activity, financial planning, business case activity, enabling projects and some project management office support.
Reset and uncertainty
Work on the programme began in 2015 and was reset in 2018, and while it was originally scheduled to be in use by 2020 it is still unclear when it is likely to go live.
Last year it was the subject of highly critical reports from the National Audit Office and Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee.
