Inland Revenue IT chief to step down

The head of the Inland Revenue's IT is to step down in July after overseeing the handover of the department's £3bn outsourcing deal from EDS to Cap Gemini.

In an exclusive interview with silicon.com, John Yard, who is director of business services at the Revenue, said he is leaving to set up an outsourcing consultancy.

Yard originally started out as a tax inspector for the Revenue and worked his way up as a project manager to run the department's IT, handling the outsourcing of 2,000 Revenue IT staff to EDS in a 10-year deal in 1994.

Since then he has overseen the integration of the Contributions Agency and the £145m Accenture national insurance system contract. Last year he ran an aggressive competition for the Aspire outsourcing contract that saw EDS ditched in favour of a consortium led by Cap Gemini.

The handover for that is due to be completed by the time Yard leaves but he said he has offered to help with the transition of roles.

"I am setting up a consultancy focused on outsourcing and relationship management to help all sorts of organisations around outsourcing," he said. "You name it, I've done it and I'm looking to use that expertise on a much wider front than just government."

The move will mark the end of an era for the Revenue and immediately rules Yard out of the contenders for the newly advertised post of CIO of a merged Inland Revenue and Customs & Excise.

The job advert in the Sunday Times this week invited applications for a director-general level position that comes with a six-figure salary and the usual public sector pension benefits.

Although talks around the merging of IT systems are at an early stage, Yard said he has been in discussions with his opposite number in Customs about the key issues.

"There are a set of workstreams around the merger - one of which is IT. Integration of IT is obviously going to be key to this," he said. "We are working through looking at what the options might be."

Read the full exclusive interview with John Yard later this week on silicon.com.