Concerns about the cost of government plans to establish regional fire service control rooms and a national radio network have resurfaced just before the technology contract is signed.
The IT deal for FiReControl, the proposed rationalisation of 46 local offices into nine district centres, is expected to be signed this month. The £350m Firelink radio network deal, awarded to O2 Airwave in March, is now being rolled out.
But local fire authorities say the financial and staffing implications of the national scheme have not been included in the business case produced by central government, placing potentially untenable burdens on local organisations.
‘The basic financial situation…is very far from satisfactory,’ says a report on FiReControl from Yorkshire and Humberside Fire Authorities’ Regional Management Board, seen by Computing. ‘The version [of the FiReControl business case] published is still an interim position and many of its underlying assumptions – particularly human resources assumptions – are not yet verified: at least some may not be achievable,’ it says.
Such concerns have been raised before. Hertfordshire County Council Community Safety Panel reported in the autumn that its fire service could not cope with the demands of a move to a new control room.
‘Initial indications are that the workload in the lead-up to the migration date in 2010 is significant and cannot be absorbed within existing resources,’ says the report.
The ever-increasing commitment needed by FiReControl and Firelink is affecting managers’ day-to-day workload, it says.
The Fire Brigades’ Union says the government must learn lessons from issues with the £6bn NHS IT programme, and ensure local support needed to make the national scheme a success is in place. Clarity over costs and funding will be crucial, it says.
‘There is a permanent malaise around the project, which has been made worse by all the mistakes made at the beginning when no one thought through all of the work needed to deliver it,’ said an FBU spokesman.
‘So the government has created a fantasy accounting where a lot of work that will remain is not counted as part of the cost, and that is fatal,’ he said.
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