Sheila Gilmore
Main Page: Sheila Gilmore (Labour - Edinburgh East)Department Debates - View all Sheila Gilmore's debates with the Department for Work and Pensions
(11 years, 2 months ago)
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Mr Duncan Smith
I will not reject the offer of the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill (Mr Byrne) because I am an optimist. On the road to Damascus, there is always a chance that such an individual may change his view and realise that what we are doing is the right thing. I will do my level best to persuade him that everything that he has done so far is wrong and that there is a better way—marked “coalition”.
Sheila Gilmore (Edinburgh East) (Lab)
The Secretary of State’s problem is that we have been here before. We were told on every occasion that everything was fine and that “Agile” programming—whatever that is—would solve all the IT problems, but now we find that “Agile” was all wrong. The problem for the Secretary of State is that he still wants to deliver this by 2017, despite the fact that he is already way behind his original timetable for delivery by then. If he accepts that there are all these problems and statements such as it is
“unlikely that Universal Credit will be…simple or cheap to administer”,
would it not be better to delay the final implementation date?
Mr Duncan Smith
The hon. Lady is right and I agree that we have been here before: the national health IT collapse costing £13 billion; the Child Support Agency failure and £120 million crash programme; and a £7.1 billion IT project that failed. The difference is that, unlike those programmes under the Labour Government, I acted to ensure that changes were made early to deliver the programme on time and on budget.