PCD 1422 MetIP Upgrade Project – 2023/24 Funding

PCD 1422 MetIP Upgrade Project – 2023/24 Funding

The MetIP upgrade project requires additional expenditure in 2023/24 in order to complete delivery of a new IT strategic platform. A new enterprise services bus will replace the MetIP bus technology, which is close to end of life, and an initial set of business critical bus services will be migrated onto the new platform. This project will mitigate technical debt and provide a new strategic platform for future projects and programmes. 

This decision seeks approval for the required expenditure in 2023/24 and a contract extension with Accenture, who currently deliver MetIP services. 

The Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime is recommended to:   

1. Approve project capital expenditure of £1,150,000 to complete the upgrade of the MetIP project, funded from the MOPAC approved Digital Policing capital budget 2023/24. 

2. Approve an extension of the MetIP Upgrade contract with Accenture by £575,000 equating to 50% of the original contract value £1,150,000, extending the Contract to £1,725,000. 

1. Introduction and background  

1. This project is delivering a new foundation capability that will replace six Business Critical Met Police Bus services currently running on an end of life Environment. The extant Environment is obsolete technology and therefore the need to create a new Strategic solution based on newer supportable technology was the subject of the FBC in 2019. 

2. The new capability is being built in the Met Police data centre, and will provide a step change in technical capability for the MPS using containerised OpenShift Cluster Technology along with a software development toolset and automated release to Production – project delivery will be far faster than the traditional way of working. 

3. New projects can leverage the Strategic OpenShift Platform and deploy Met Police new capabilities / Applications onto the Met Police data centre. 

4. Mitigation of technical debt is a key outcome of the Bus Service Migrations. 

5. The corporate supported and managed service has a new set of enterprise software design tools to deliver content to Live / Production environments with a clear focus on Software & Continuous development.  

2. Issues for consideration  

1. The delivery of a new Strategic Platform – enabler for faster project deliveries, reducing costs, technical debt and offering corporate support with full disaster recovery. 

2. Migration of the initial six Critical Business Services and future Bus Service Migrations  

3. Financial Comments  

1. MPS assure that the additional costs of £1.15m required in 2023/24 are funded from the MOPAC approved Digital Policing capital budget 2023/24. 

4. Legal Comments  

1. The Mayor’s Officer for Policing Crime is a Contracting Authority as defined in the Public Contracts Regulations 2015 (“the Regulations”). All awards of public contracts for goods and/or services valued at £213,477 (inclusive of VAT) or above will be procured in accordance with the Regulations. 

2. Paragraph 4.8 of the MOPAC Scheme of Delegation and Consent provides the Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime has delegated authority to approve Business cases for revenue or capital expenditure of £500,000 and above. 

3. Paragraph 4.13 of the MOPAC Scheme of Delegation and Consent provides the Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime has delegated authority to approve all unforeseen variations and extensions to contracts with an original value of £500,000 or above, when the variation or extension is greater than 10% of the original value and/or is for a period of more than 12 months. 

4. Upon approval by the MOPAC, the Director of Commercial Services may sign contracts irrespective of value, provided they are not required to be sealed (under 7.26 of the MOPAC Scheme of Consent and Delegation). 

5. The existing contract may be compliantly extended by up to 50% in accordance with Regulation 72(2)(b) of the Regulations. 

6. Additional services required for project team resources, and design work shall be procured compliantly via the MPS SPF2 Framework and/or an existing value added reseller contract (such as the HTE Framework). 

5. Commercial Issues  

1. The additional costs required in 2023/24 are detailed in the restricted section. The extra costs are required due to a delay to the project within the service design cadre (caused by a lack of key Subject Matter Experts). The main bulk of the extra funding will be allocated to a contract extension for the Prime Supplier – Accenture (contracted via the SPF Call Off Contract Framework) with in-house purchase orders to Met Police key suppliers – Capgemini, ATOS, BT, i15.  

2. Value for Money has been achieved via Competitive Tender of the Bus Service Migration and Transformation – via the SPF Call Off Contract / Framework for the Prime supplier scope of works. Note – the delivery of an OpenShift platform was a Met Police Technical Design Authority [TDA] mandate to align to the Met Police technical roadmap. 

3. The MetIP Upgrade Project contributes to delivering the London Anchor Institutions’ Charter  as an enabler for future projects as articulated in the section – Contributes to the MOPAC Police & Crime Plan 2022-25.  

6. GDPR and Data Privacy  

1. The MetIP Upgrade Project has no Business End Users but is planning to undertake a DPIA in part or whole once the end state design is fully delivered to the pre-production environment in the Met Police data centre Q2 / Q3 2023. The solution is a Bus Service which moves messages from Met Application to Met Application with audit data of message sent – not content. The Project Manager will review with the DPIA authority in-year to ascertain the scope / compliance against DPIA. 

7. Equality Comments  

1. This business case has undergone an initial Equality screening. Due regard has been taken to ensure compliance with the Equality Act in particular the Public Sector Equality Duty. Real consideration has been taken to assess Equality impact caused by the proposed business case. As a result, no negative impact has been identified to any individual and/or group safeguarded by a protected characteristic and to those who are not negating the requirement to document any mitigation. 

2. As the intention of this document is to seek additional funding for an existing function, there is no real organizational change. Further reviews will be conducted and if any new Equality Impact is identified, a full Equality Impact Assessment will be initiated. 

8. Background/supporting papers 

1. PCD 538 previously approved £4.0m of capital funding to support the MetIP upgrade; this request for £1.15m of capital funding is in addition to this and will take total project funding to £5.15m.