According to a Conservative member of its cabinet, the somerset county council’s troubled outsourcing contract with the Southwest one has stalled the authority’s program of cost cuts. With the IBM in which Somerset owns a 17.5% share, southwest one a shared services venture has meanwhile begun actively working against Somerset’s interests. However, after the dramatic cut in council payments predicated a succession of the financial losses at the outsourcing venture.
The councillor David Huxtable stated that the Southwest one was stopping the council making cuts or privatizing services because it refused to give up its claim for fees on services the council discontinued. According also to him, every part of their organization has a prt of Southwest One appended to it whether it is buying a financial services, property advice or whatever. However a local authorities can not afford to do all the stuff that they used to do.
They want a change, they are almost precluded from doing because they will be carrying the overhead forever, unless they can renegotiate parts of the contract. The Conservative-led council had been trying to change it contract ever since it won power from the Liberal Democrats in the local election. In 2010, the conservatives cut payments to Southwest One by 31%. The somerset had accounted for 75% of the outsource ventures income. Yet by 2011, the council had cut payments to supplier by over 50% accounting for the majority of its lost income.
The only other council that joined the Southwest One Partnership is Taunton Deane District Council, cut its annual payments by just £1m since 2008. The Avon and Somerset Police the only other public body to join the venture, increased its payments by 70% or £8m. The three authorities account for 90% of Southwest One’s revenue. In the harsh of political world it was a contract set up by the Liberal Democrats and they’ve spent the last three years trying to renegotiate it to get more flexibility in the contract.
The Southwest One said in its annual accounts that it had successfully completed the onstallation of an SAP system, it has been anticipated, help it operate more efficiently. The Southwest One nor Somerset council would confirm how much money the former was claiming in its legal action. They said that in a statement that its legal action find the recovery of sums due under contract.
REFERENCE:
http://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240162786/Southwest-One-is-blocking-Somerset-cuts-says-county-councillor
