Outgoing Somerset County Council 'spending £20m' on IT update

A Conservative MP has accused his local council of spending £20m on a new IT system just 12 months before it formally ceases to exist.

Somerset County Council will be replaced by a new unitary authority on 1 April 2023.

Ian Liddell-Grainger told the House of Commons there was "no urgent need" for the IT investment before then.

The council said it was essential for running payroll after the transition and would save taxpayers money.

The MP for Bridgwater and West Somerset made his statement in the House of Commons on 17 March.

Mr Liddell-Grainger afterwards clarified that he had estimated the total of cost of "ultimately £20m" from the council's figure of £8m.

He told the Local Democracy Reporting Service: "The truth is it will probably cost an awful lot more to integrate every need satisfactorily - if such integration is possible at all.

"I reckon £20m is the likely bill."

Officers said the new system would save taxpayers more than £5.5m upfront and lead to lower running costs, meaning more money could be provided for front-line services.

"The problem we have is that there will be unitary elections in May, with the four district councils still there, but the system will be neither one thing nor the other," said Mr Liddell-Grainger.

He added that counties and districts buy expensive systems "that inevitably tend not to work".

He said his concern was "two-fold and non-political".

"For a fag-end cabinet to order a system to be used by a totally new council just seems wrong, unless there is an urgent need to replace everything now.

"There is no such urgent need.

Mr Liddell-Grainger said the "only honest and fair way to proceed" would be to make the decision when the new administration takes over.

His added that the council's previous IT system South West One was a "complete administrative and financial disaster area which was high-risk from the word 'go'".

Somerset County Council's cabinet discussed the new IT software on 16 March, with the project cost being estimated at £7.662m, plus an additional £1.473m being provided as a contingency.

It said the new system was essential to ensuring staff could be paid when the new unitary authority formally takes control and said leaving a decision until this point could have ultimately cost taxpayers even more.

A council spokesman said: "The new Somerset Council needs to be able to pay its bills, and that means having a single ledger system in place on 1 April 2023.

"Doing nothing is obviously not an option."

He added that the new Microsoft system would save £400,000 in annual running costs.

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