Defra IT - blowing budgets and showing up late

Major IT projects at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) are millions over budget and years late, it has been revealed.

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With an £11m overspend and slippage of up to two years on its large tech projects Defra is the latest government department with a poor IT track record.

A string of failed IT projects across government is estimated to have cost nearly £2bn since 2000.

Defra minister Jonathan Shaw revealed the setbacks in a written Parliamentary answer to Vince Cable, deputy leader of the Liberal Democrats.

The biggest IT project affected is the 'Whole Farm Approach' - a web-based system for the country's 120,000 farms, and farmers who sign up will be able to start simplifying the way they do business with government.

It is supposed to help cut the amount of red tape affecting the industry, and Defra claims it will save it up to £28m a year but the project is now expected to be completed one year late and £9m over budget.

The IT behind Defra's 'Renew' internal reform programme is four months late and £2.4m over budget, while the spatial information repository is running two years late and £1.1m over budget.

The one bright spot is the customer land database, which is expected to be £129,400 under budget.

Shaw said he could not detail the costs of smaller IT projects in Defra as it would cost the department a disproportionate amount.

It follows several recent government IT blunders such as the scaling back of the National Offender Management Service, which is £500m over budget, and the revelation that a new fire control IT system was expected to be £70m over.

The Treasury recently launched a review of government spending on IT under a wider examination of the costs of national projects.

Chief secretary to the Treasury, Yvette Cooper, will scrutinise how the state delivers about a dozen major projects in areas ranging from NHS purchasing programmes to road building - including looking at the IT systems underpinning these schemes.

No one at Defra was available for comment.