More controversy has engulfed the national offender management information system (C-Nomis) after MPs launched a scathing attack on its implementation.
The public accounts committee's (PAC) report describes it as a singular example of poor project management.
Roll out of the rescoped programme has only just begun after the initial project, scheduled for delivery in January 2008 at a cost of £234m, was stopped in August 2007 because the costs had trebled. A scaled back version is now being promised for 2011 at a cost of £513m.
C-Nomis was originally designed as a single database for end-to-end offender management across the Prison Service and the National Probation Service.
According to the report this was ambitious but technically feasible, but the National Offender Management Service (Noms) lost control. It underestimated the technical complexity and the need to standardise ways of working to avoid excessive customisation.
The programme also suffered from poor planning and financial management, PAC heard, along with inadequate supplier management and too little control over changes.
As Kable reports, over the first three years there was no monitoring of costs or progress, in part because the senior responsible owner had no relevant training or experience.
The project board, the Noms board and the Home Office senior management only became aware of the true cost and progress in May 2007, and even now Noms is unable to provide full details on where £161m spent up to October 2007 went.
Edward Leigh, chair of the PAC, said: "This committee has become inured to the dismal procession of government IT failures which have passed before us; but even we were surprised by the extent of the failure of C-Nomis, the ambitious project to institute a single database to manage individual offenders through the prison and probation systems.
"Noms, the body managing the project, was formed in 2004 from the merger of two complex and very different organisations. This placed a severe strain on senior managers' ability to deliver such a major project.
He added that "there was not even a minimum level of competence in the planning and execution of this project", and described it as a "shambles".
Noms has told the PAC that it has implemented the changes needed to deliver the revised programme by 2011, but the report says there are significant challenges yet to address, including further contract negotiations with suppliers.
A spokesperson for the Ministry of Justice, the parent department of Noms, commented: "We note the contents of this report and will respond fully in due course. The C-Nomis project was stopped when it was recognised that it was going to be over-budget and late. Steps have been taken to ensure that the mistakes made are not repeated."
