States IT outage sparks call for extra investment

The outage in November was caused by the failure of air conditioning systems in the server room, the States said

An independent report into the States of Guernsey's IT outage last year is set to recommend extra investment in infrastructure.

Consultants PwC were commissioned to carry out the review earlier this year.

Policy and Resources member Deputy Bob Murray said he believed more would need to be spent on IT infrastructure than initially estimated.

The outage in November was caused by the failure of air conditioning systems in the server room, said the States.

Since then there have been intermittent issues with other systems.

The outages have had a serious impact on education locally, with National Education Union (NEU) representative for Guernsey, Paul Montague, describing the problems as "chronic".

The States has also carried out an internal review of the outage, alongside the PwC report, which will be published before the end of the month.

Initially Policy and Resources had insisted it would only conduct an internal review, but after three months of pressure from deputies, including former Deputy Chief Minister Heidi Soulsby, it commissioned PwC at a cost of £78,000.

Policy and Resources President, Peter Ferbrache, said IT infrastructure was "certainly a concern".

"We need to provide resilient IT and we haven't been doing that, we can't hide that," he said.

When asked by the BBC whether fixing the issues would require substantial investment Mr Ferbrache said "I don't know the sums on how much it will cost, I'm not being coy - but I'd be surprised if it doesn't."

Some States of Guernsey IT systems were affected by an outage on 11 May.

'Good progress'

A spokesman for the States said: "The specific issues affecting internal systems last week were resolved by the end of Friday. Importantly, gov.gg and most public-facing services were not affected thanks to steps taken earlier in the year to improve the resilience of these services.

"That is part of the wider transformation of IT across the public sector which is a major programme, and a priority for the States."

The States said the issues affecting schools on Thursday and Friday affected some schools more than others, and said these had also been resolved.

The States added: "More generally schools are an area most affected by outdated network equipment and applications, and where the transformation which is underway is especially needed.

"Good progress is being made, and new network equipment has been deployed to nearly all schools, and they will also see enhanced Wi-Fi and other upgrades as part of the programme of improvements being delivered over the rest of this year.

"With regard to the harbours, there are no reported issues affecting services other than one specific outstanding issue affecting the display of arrivals and departures information.

"This is supported by a third party and we are working with them to investigate and fix this as quickly as possible, and we apologise for any inconvenience."

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