Authorities now considering options after termination of IT system programme ‘by mutual agreement’
Scotland's i6 police IT programme has been wrapped up early with the termination of the contract between the Scottish Police Authority (SPA) and Police Scotland with Accenture.
The authorities said the move was based on a mutual agreement with the professional services company following a review of its progress.
This comes under sustained criticism of the delivery, culminating in a series of complaints to the Scottish Parliament’s Justice Sub-Committee on Policing when it held a hearing on i6 in February. There have been reports of dozens of flaws in the system and its implementation, originally scheduled for 2015, was seriously delayed.
John Foley, chief executive of the SPA, said: “Despite the best efforts of the SPA, Police Scotland and Accenture, it was clear that the technical solution cannot be delivered within expected timeframes and budget. The decision has therefore been taken to end the contract and reconsider options for securing a sustainable IT solution for policing.
“Management and oversight of the i6 programme was led by the SPA and underpinned by robust contract arrangements. It was also subject to regular review and assurance.
“The contract has been ended and a mutually agreed settlement has been signed by all parties. The terms of the agreement are commercially confidential, however we can confirm that the settlement results in no financial detriment to the police budget.
“While we are disappointed that i6 will not be delivered as expected, the SPA believes the decision to end the contract at this time is the right one.
“We would seek to reassure the public and our workforce that the output of i6 was only one element of our overall ICT plans. In the last three years we have rolled out a number of national applications to improve and enhance our IT systems and made significant investment in modernising our desktop estate. We have not stood still while awaiting delivery of i6 and we remain committed to delivering a sustainable policing model supported by modern technology.
“As with any programme of this nature or size, an independent review to ensure the SPA and Police Scotland learn lessons from this project will be initiated. This will inform our options for a sustainable IT solution going forward and which we would expect to see emerging in the months ahead. Work already under way to set out a vision and strategy for policing over the next decade will also heavily inform next steps.”
Accenture won the 10-year, £60 million deal i6 in 2013. The programme was aimed at bringing together more than 100 existing systems, but problems in areas such as audit and search reportedly emerged during testing. These led to the implementation being pushed back before the decision to abandon the project.
Image by Dave Conner (amended), CC BY 2.0 through flickr
