Home Office gets quick fix IT partner

The Home Office has agreed a £50m interim deal to run the IT at the National Probation Service, because of delays in trying to find a long-term partner.

The two and a half year contract has been awarded to Integris, formerly the services arm of Bull, the company criticised by the National Audit Office (NAO) for the poor implementation of the Probation Service's case management system earlier this year.

The NAO had warned that failure to find a new long-term partner would mean finding an expensive short-term fix.

The Home Office says the delays in procuring a deal were down to staff shortages, and that the additional costs would be minor compared with the size of the long-term contract which is due to be finalised in 2004.

"It's a stepping stone on the way to a new contract," said Richard Crade, a board director at Integris. "This is an interim contract to achieve that."

The managed services contract will give the Probation Service's 15,000 users 99.8 per cent availability of their IT through a technical upgrade and rationalisation, which will include the development of server farms.

"This will raise the level of delivery and align it to the national service," explained Crade. "The lessons of the NAO report have definitely been taken on board."