MPs call for Pims inquiry

Cost and ease of use of Parliamentary Information Management System questioned

MPs are demanding an inquiry into the cost effectiveness and usability of the Parliamentary Information Management System (Pims).

Nine of them have signed a Commons motion complaining the information system for the House of Commons and House of Lords is 'cumbersome and slow' and 'wasteful of the time of staff of the House, Members and their staff'.

They are also objecting to 'delays in the updating of information', in the system which has cost some £9m and replaced the previous 20-year-old Parliamentary Online Indexing Service known as Polis operated by the Commons and Lords Libraries.

Instigator Anne Main, Conservative MP for St Albans, says she acted after complaints to Library staff failed to generate any improvements.

'Millions of pounds have been spent and it seems to be very difficult and more complicated and time-consuming to use than it needs to be,' Main said. 'It must be made more user-friendly.'

Hemel Hempstead Tory MP Mike Penning said: 'It is simply not up to 21st century standards by a long way and there needs to be an urgent inquiry into why it is not performing anywhere near the standard we require.'

A spokesman for the Commons authorities declined to comment but drew attention to a written statement in reply to a question in which North Devon Liberal Democrat MP Nick Harvey, for the House of Commons Commission, admitted there had been 'some initial difficulties with maintaining the currency of information in the system'.

Harvey said: 'The PIMS project's aims were to provide easy access to parliamentary information for all users of the parliamentary intranet, by creating a new infrastructure for the storage, search, retrieval and management of parliamentary information held in the two Libraries.'

He said a programme of technical changes designed to improve performance had been put in place last November [2005] and further enhancements would be made before the project concludes this spring [2006].

A separate project is under way to develop the Parliamentary intranet building on the PIMS infrastructure and there are proposals for a radical redesign of the Parliament web site.