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Sent to my local District Councillor and the Head of the current council
(John Hart)
Quote
Good Morning
In January I wrote to Dr Norrey at County Hall as follows:
"The current IT strategic plan lasts until 2009 and while on a total Council budget
of £800m, the costs of proprietary software with emphasis on Microsoft Office are de
minimis, they are a quick and simple area for saving money.
Microsoft are ending support for Office 2000 in July 2009, and for Office XP in July
2011. As Devon County Council has about 6782 computers running Microsoft Office, the
direct costs for these computers over the next 10 years will be at least £670,000
(assuming license fees of £10 per computer per year). By comparison the French
Parliament switched 1145 PCs to free opensource software and reported savings of Eur
500,000 ie ~ £ 400,000 (ie on the same maths Devon could save £2,369,000)."
I went on to provide examples of other European Governments that have saved larger
sums from switching eg German Foreign Ministry (11000 computers), Munich Government
(14000 computers). This excludes what appears to be most Developing Countries who
are standardising on Open Source. This also excludes Bristol City Government (6000
computers) who offer their experience if any other Council wishes to switch:
http://www.opensourceacademy.gov.uk/solutions/casestudies
http://www.opensourceacademy.gov.uk/osacademy/our_partners/bristol-city-council/bristol-city-councill/bristol-city-council
There was an exchange of correspondence, and since then I have gathered additional
information under the Freedom of Information Act.
The current situation appears to be:
1/ All software purchased from Devon Council is part of a SW Consortium Agreement.
This agreement cuts costs by building scale across Councils in the South West for
the purchase of hardware and software.
2/ The current software meets the business needs of the County Council, and as such
any change would be in line with DCC Corporate procurement policies.
3/ (As an aside Torbay in one Freedom of Information reply stated that they should
work with vendors in this area:)
http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/total_cost_of_ownership_of_softw#incoming-29231
Fine: all professional but
a) I could see nothing in the Corporate Procurement Policy that covers the
downloading and use of Free Software. Similarly the SW Consortium Agreement did not
cover support for Open Source software: only purchase and support of existing
proprietary software.
b) There is no business case that rejects Open Source / Free software and indeed the
Council does "make wide use of Open Systems particularly in Web, Firewall and
Security systems". But if Open Source is used in some areas and has never been
rejected then why isn't the default option "use Free / open source" and require
separate additional approval for non-free programmes. (This co-incidentally is the
Dutch Government approach).
c) Any change in software is going to have to be planned carefully and will take a
few years to successfully implement. It is not immediate. But because it is not
immediate it needs planning. Nothing appears to be planned.
I am not a programmer, ......... I only discovered Open Source software when I was
helping friends set up a manufacturing company and was trying to cut costs. I do not
believe it can be used exclusively but I do believe that if local Government
implements it sensibly there are the following savings:
- Lower total cost of ownership
- Improved security
- Lower risk
eg http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/09/04/ealing_council_mystery_malware/
- Improved skills in Devon. If the software can be easily tailored to Devon CC exact
needs then that provides jobs and skills for local programmers as well as improving
service.
May I call on you to demonstrate how easy it can be to use and to answer any
question you may have. If possible I would like to bring along one or two others who
work in IT and are more able to quote facts and figures.
End Quote
--
Henry
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