South Wales Evening Post - 21 November 2005
Swansea Council is to ask the Assembly for permission to borrow £14 million to deliver its Service@Swansea plans.
It is thought to cost the authority around £2 million in interest alone. Details of the plans are understood to be part of a draft report that has split the Lib Dem, Independent and Conservative coalition that controls the council.
The report was to give chief executive Tim Thorogood power to approve the deal with Capgemini, the company chosen to help deliver the council's e-Government programme. But there has been growing concern over the deal, with staff and officers voicing worries.
There are also understood to be cracks in the LIC coalition over the controversial move. Independent councillors are understood to be unhappy with the plans and have asked for more information, according to a source within the group.Conservative councillor Paxton Hood-Williams said he was not aware of any problems.
A source at Swansea Council said senior management now had concerns about the affordability of the scheme.
He said: "Service@Swansea is a black hole that is sucking staff and resources away from front-line services. No-one believes in it any more." The source claimed that although quoted costs for the scheme had not changed, it was not going to be delivering what was originally expected.
He said plans to develop a 150-seat call centre in County Hall for the scheme would not be part of the first phase, and plans to relocate the library and create a new website and automated complaints handling service were now on the back-burner.
He said the cabinet will only be signing up to a "first phase" in which the ICT contract and council staff are transferred to Capgemini.
He said: "The council will be paying millions to have the same people sat at the same desks in County Hall providing the same service but through a private company."Nothing else is affordable."
A spokesman for Swansea Council said: "The issues raised are about steps that are entirely consistent with normal business practice on projects of this size. However, the claims being made are not accurate.
"As is commonly the case in projects of this size, some capitalisation will take place to fund the e-Government programme. This was always part of the detailed business plan, is no surprise and does not affect the overall £100m cost of the project over its lifetime."
He said the "back of office" part of the project had to be in place before the "front of office" things like a call and contact centre could be developed.
Mary Jones, cabinet member for Top Performance and e-Government, said the scheme was the most exciting and ambitious project of its kind planned by any local authority in Wales.
She said: "Swansea is leading the way on this, and over the lifetime of the project, e-Government will pay for itself.
"The real benefit is that it will help meet the council's ambition to be a top performing authority, delivering the services council taxpayers want."
