Wastewatch: Governmental ICT waste
29 August 2005
In a report in the Scunthorpe Telegraph (16 August) entitled 'Internet scheme hailed a success' - a £190,000 scheme to provide 35 households with a computer and internet access in the Scunthorpe estate of Priory Gardens has been 'hailed a success' by North Lincolnshire Council.
The scheme was set up by North Lincs Net - the computer arm of North Lincolnshire Council - and the Northern Counties Housing Association with one year's funding from the Single Regeneration Budget from central government.
Thirty five families were given a free computer, training and a wireless internet connection. Although the service was designed to put the families on the internet, the wireless connection to Trent View House no longer works due to 'technical problems with the receiver'.
Cllr Alan Holgate - leader of North Lincolnshire Council - stated in the Telegraph article: 'Overall the project has been a success'.
The cost of the project works out at £5,428.57p to put each house on the internet.
Ed. Hmmmm. Those figures look a bit worrying. So I set about doing a few sums...
How much should it cost then to equip 35 families with a PC and internet connection?
| £579 | Acer Laptop from Comet - intel pentium m - 1.5GHz - 512mb ram - 60GByte HD - DVD & CD Read writer - 15" screen |
| £35 | Printer: Epson Stylus |
| £250 | Maintenance cover (5 years) |
| £75 | New BT phone line |
| £153 | 2 courses at Ashby Link: ICT Computers for beginners (Ashby link) + Beginners guide to internet and email |
| £20 | Telephone handset (optional) |
| £1113 | Total each |
| ------- | |
| £384 | Year's line rental (BT) and broadband (Wannadoo) |
| ====== | |
| £52,395 | Total cost for first year for 35 families. |
This price of £52,395 works out at only 28% of the cost of the 'official' project. Or to put it another way: the public sector cost is over 3.5 times as much as a member of the public could arrange - and it would take a morning to arrange this too.
Ed. If this project is a 'success' I dread to think what would constitute a 'failure' for Cllr Alan Holgate of North Lincolnshire Council - given that the project did not succeed in its expected outcomes and cost 3 times more than a private individual could have arranged it for. The deeper question is: why does the government / council think that this is an appropriate way to spend public money?
Another way of looking at this spending is: To get rid of the same amount of money someone would have to shred one £5 note per minute continuously for over 79 working days to waste £190,000.
... and the 'funniest' (or should I say 'saddest') thing is that after spending all of our money - the computers still didn't work ... :-(