The Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) is running a wide range of information technology-enabled projects. Some are managed centrally, while others are initiated and managed by the holders of devolved budgets both in the UK or at posts overseas. For those centrally managed projects, and groups of projects marshalled together as programmes around a significant business change, the requested details are shown in the following table.
Current information technology projects > £2 million Start date Original planned completion date Expected completion date Originally planned costs (£ million) Estimated costs (£ million) Future Firecrest (AIM)1 February 2005 February 2012 February 2012 332.0 347.0 FCONet 32 March 2006 June 2007 February 2008 3.5 < 3.5 EDRM (eRecords/iRecords)3 September 2004 March 2010 March 2010 26.5 12.4 FCO Web Platform4 July 2005 November 2008 November 2008 13.5 9.7 Secure Video Conferencing April 2007 March 2008 March 2008 2.5 2.5 Managed Reporting Service January 2007 January 2008 January 2008 2.5 2.4 FTN (FCO Telecommunications Network) private finance initiative implementation and service 2000-105 May 2000 May 2010 May 2010 180.0 240.0 Ocean (Telecommunications reprocurement)6 October 2007 May 2010 May 2010 > 72 — UKvisas Biometrics May 2005 December 2007 March 2008 121.7 45.5 1 The cost of Future Firecrest has been increased by the obligation to implement central Government security policies instituted after the Future Firecrest contract had been agreed. 2 Exact final project costs are being calculated, and are known to be less than the £3.5 million budget, but are not available at the time of writing. 3 The scope of iRecords has been reduced in the light of financial constraints. 4 The scope, and hence costs, were reduced on examination of the full business case. 5 FTN is a service, chargeable by usage. The additional cost reflects a demand that has increased significantly since the original estimates of traffic volumes were drawn up in 2000. Unit costs have been reduced, but this is obscured in the headline figure. 6 The scope, and hence the cost, of Ocean will be determined shortly; the cost of the procurement is likely to exceed £2 million. 7 To be determined. Note: Implementation of the Prism system, reported on in previous answers, was completed in May 2006, two months later than originally planned, and the implementation programme was closed at the end of March 2007 following the recommendation of an Office of Government Commerce Gateway Review.