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The British Government is stepping up the dismantling of an £11.4-billion project to create electronic record cards for patients with the National Health Service (NHS).
Tata Consultancy Services in an alliance headed by Japan's Fujitsu won an £896-million pound nine-year contract for the South of England as part of that project back in 2004. Then, the Tata subsidiary estimated the deal could generate around £120 million in turnover.
Tata Consultancy Services declined to comment on whether it remains involved in the project. “TCS does not comment on the status of specific projects,” it said in a statement. “We can confirm that there is no impact to our business or revenues by this announcement.” Fujitsu announced it would be withdrawing from the NHS project in 2008 after attempts to renegotiate the deal failed, though TCS had then said it was not impacted.
Building pressure
The latest announcement on Thursday is expected to pile pressure on the project's biggest contractors: Computer Sciences Corporation and BT. An oversight committee led by Mr Francis Maude, Britain's Cabinet Office Minister will oversee all IT work for the NHS.
The project had been set up by the former Labour Government in 2002 to allow patient data to be easily passed across the NHS through a national programme.
The Government, which has launched numerous reviews of waste in the public sector, began examining the project earlier this year, and concluded that a system that allowed local authorities to design their own IT systems rather than have to take part in a centrally designed system was what the NHS needed. “It is no longer appropriate for a centralised authority to make decisions on behalf of local organisations,” the Department of Health said in a statement.
The message that the Government is keen to squeeze more value out of existing contracts is clear. “We will continue to work with our existing suppliers to determine the best way to deliver the services upon which the NHS depends in a way which allows the local NHS to exercise choice while delivering best value for money,” said the statement. The Government also said it would be working with partners to create a market place to ensure smaller and medium-sized firms could get involved in such projects.
“The National Programme for IT embodies the type of unpopular top-down programme that has been imposed on front-line NHS staff in the past,” said Mr Maude.
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