Fire project costs spiral

Technology costs for the government’s planned regional Fire Service control rooms have risen by £70m – more than 50 per cent – in just two years.

Contracts for the FiReControl project to consolidate 46 local offices into nine district centres are not expected to be signed until January. But official cost estimates released to Parliament have already reached £190m, up from £120m in 2004.

The Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG), which is responsible for FiReControl, blames inflation and unrealistic early assumptions.

The programme is already more than two years behind schedule because of the government’s initial impractical timetable (Computing, 9 November). And Fire Service insiders say the original cost estimates show a similarly woeful grasp of the complexities.

‘The original £120m figure was plucked from the air,’ Terry Walker, chairman of Avon Fire and Rescue, told Computing. ‘It has been changing as the department has been finding out about what Fire Service control centres are actually required to do.’

Further cost rises are likely, prompting concerns about Treasury commitment to the scheme, says Walker.

‘The difficulty is that the department is pushing ahead, when as far as we can see the costs are spiralling and the final figure is not even known,’ he said. ‘If the costs escalate too far the Treasury is likely to say it is unacceptable.’

The government must not cut corners on IT to win political battles over funding, according to the Fire Brigades Union (FBU).

‘Trying to shoehorn the project into a budget to justify the claim that it would pay for itself is enormously dangerous,’ said an FBU spokesman. ‘You cannot have a Rolls Royce specification and expect to pay Skoda prices.’

Liberal Democrat Treasury spokesman Vincent Cable, whose parliamentary question prompted publication of the figures, said: ‘There still appears to be an alarmingly large number of IT projects such as FiReControl which are massively overrunning on either cost or deadlines.’

A DCLG spokeswoman said: ‘The project has moved from 2004 prices to 2006 prices and many of the assumptions have been revised as a result of negotiations with bidders.’

Suppliers Thales and EADS are the remaining bidders for the FiReControl contract.

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