South Wales Evening Post - 20 April 2007
Swansea Council spent more than £4 million of taxpayers' cash on specialist consultants for advice on a botched IT deal.
The figures emerged in a report which criticises the way the council handled the contract to replace ageing computer systems.
Swansea-based IT firm Capgemini won the contract and the deal, worth £83 million, was signed in December 2005.
Councillor Vanessa Webb, who sits on a council committee looking at the IT programme, said questions needed to be answered about information given by consultants.
She said: "We need to know if they were asked the right questions by this council. We have paid a lot of money, more than £4 million, and need to know what we got."
According to the writers of the report, the firms all carried out the job they were asked to do by councillors and senior managers involved in the procurement process.
However, it has been revealed that the programme is failing to deliver millions of pounds worth of savings. Instead of realising benefits worth more than £17.3 million, the deal will in fact end up costing taxpayers £2.5 million over 10 years - meaning a mismatch in figures totalling nearly £20 million.
The report, from audit firm Pricewaterhouse Coopers, said serious mistakes were made in the run-up to the deal being signed, a fact that has been acknowledged by Swansea Council's chief executive Paul Smith.
"The PWC report clearly outlines a series of serious weaknesses associated with the development of the eGovernment programme," he said.
"As a council, we need to admit the weakness."
The report was commissioned by councillors after it became clear that projected savings would be missed.
It was being discussed by full council last night.
