Uproar over taxpayers’ £469m for fire service white elephants

The National Audit Office (NAO) says the FireControl project to replace England’s 46 fire control rooms in England with nine purpose-built regional centres better equipped to handle major incidents was “flawed from the outset” because it did not have crucial support and was mismanaged by the Government.

It has left taxpayers paying £100,000 a month in rent for a centre in Wakefield to sit empty, with three of Yorkshire’s four fire services not interested in using it and West Yorkshire saying it is unlikely to do so because it would be too expensive.

The NAO said the project – which has now been scrapped by coalition Ministers – is “yet another example of a Government IT project taking on a life of its own, absorbing ever-increasing resources without reaching its objectives”, and said the project had been a “comprehensive failure”.

Today’s report is the latest indictment of a project which was expected to cost £120m when it was started only for the forecast budget to have hit £635m by the time the plug was pulled.

It says the programme was rushed by the Department of Communities and Local Government, failed to follow procedures and has left eight centres sitting empty.

Margaret Hodge, Chairman of the Committee of Public Accounts, said the report was “in a league of its own” and will grill officials over the scheme next week.

“We will want to know how the Department got into this mess and why taxpayers will be saddled with a burden of at least £469m,” she said.

“All they will have to show for it are nine white elephants – purpose built regional control centres which nobody wants and no one is likely to use, but which will continue to waste taxpayers’ money for the next 20 years.”

The report reveals for the first time that contractor EADS – which was responsible for delivering the project – actually had to pay the Government £22.5m when the project was cancelled, although over the course of the project the company received a net payment of £11m.

The NAO concludes that Ministers were justified in axing the project, but with some of the centres having been completed in 2007 the Government has already spent more than £32m in upkeep of empty centres, with the Wakefield building – designed to cater for West, South and North Yorkshire services and Humberside – costing taxpayers £100,531 a month in rent.

Fire Brigades Union general secretary Matt Wrack said: “Millions of pounds were thrown away on management consultants, regional project directors, change co-ordinators, project assurance directors, PR and human resource directors.

“This project was run by Government with astonishing levels of incompetence. There was a reckless use of taxpayers’ money at a time when frontline fire services were being cut.”

Amyas Morse, head of the National Audit Office, said: “The rationale and benefits of a regional approach were unclear and badly communicated to locally accountable fire and rescue services who remained unconvinced. Essential checks and balances in the early stages of the project were ineffective.”

Communities Secretary Eric Pickles said: “This official report represents another damning indictment of Labour’s track record on expensive IT projects. It is no surprise that Labour led the country to the brink of bankruptcy when they can’t even manage the spiralling costs of a misguided project.”