By Julian Whittle

Published at 11:24, Monday, 16 July 2012

Cumbria County Council is to run its own ICT services after talks with outside providers broke down.

The authority handed over ICT – which covers everything from telephones to computers, including sensitive data security – to a private company, Agilisys, in 2005.

Agilisys’s contract was due to end on April 1.

The council re-tendered and named Computacenter as “preferred bidder” only to announce in March that it had been unable to agree terms.

Agilisys continued to provide the service while the council negotiated with another provider, understood to be Fujitsu.

The council has now decided to run ICT itself.

It believes it will save money but declined to say how much.

Deputy leader Stewart Young said: “At a time when every penny needs to be accounted for and spent wisely we cannot justify spending more on a service than is required.

“This decision also retains greater control over the long-term structure of the service at a time when local government is under financial pressure.”

Around 70 staff are likely to transfer from Agilisys to the council by October 1.

Published by http://www.newsandstar.co.uk