UK Probation Service forced to rebuild computer systems

The probation service may be about to scrap its controversial Case Record Management System (CRAMS).

The system has been dogged with problems since the government began a nationwide roll-out in 1995.

Version 4.6 of the software, only last Friday passed user tests to ensure millennium compliance. However, according to sources close to the situation, the government is to tender for a new system, most likely in the second quarter of next year. The Home Office has refused to comment however, saying only that the matter is under consideration.

Representatives of probation workers say the front-end of the system is causing all the problems - being impossible to navigate, slow to use and riddled with bugs. Users are also unable to search via aliases and unable to correct mistakes once inputted.

Harry Fletcher, assistant general secretary for the National Association of Probation Officers (NAPO) called for a full Public Accounts Committee enquiry into the way the scheme has been managed and blamed Home Office indifference to reports of the difficulties. UNISON said it had heard countless complaints from members about the system - with workers complaining simple ten minute tasks now took half an hour with the CRAMS system.

Bull, who have been responsible for the roll out of the system, defended the scheme, saying the CRAMS system was only one small part of a much larger project to computerise all of the probation service.

Stephen Meyler, Marketing Director for Bull, said that Bull had made the best of a system designed internally by the Probation Service, which it had to deploy across the country. Many of the initial problems had been cured in later versions of the software, he insisted.

The Home Office admits it has encountered "resistance" within the probation service to CRAMS, but publicly blames this on the large cultural change of a move from a paper-based environment to a computerised system.

However, John Hague, national safety representative for NAPO, was adamant that the system was a failure: "This has been an immense waste of public money which people are right to be very angry about."