Written question asked by Brooks Newmark (Conservative) on Thursday, 25 January 2007, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Monday, 29 January 2007. It was answered by Barry Gardiner (Labour) on Thursday, 22 February 2007 on behalf of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.

Departmental Expenditure

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs how much was spent by his Department on buying, operating and supporting (a) all commercial software products and (b) software products produced by Microsoft was in each of the last three years.

Answer: In October 2004 Defra outsourced its IT capabilities, forming a strategic partnership with IBM. IBM now provides Defra with end-to-end IT and business change services, this includes the provision of software.It is therefore not possible to separately identify the cost of buying, operating and supporting software from the cost of providing desktop services as a whole.The total cost of desktop services provided to core-Defra for the financial years 2004-05, 2005-06 and 2006-07 is approximately £7.4 million, £13.6 million and £11.9 million respectively.The level of information requested is not available prior to October 2004 as the necessary accounting codes needed to identify this expenditure were not in place.

Secondary information

Type: Written question
Reference: 112598; 457 c872W;457 c855-6W
Session: 2006-07
Subjects: Software Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Microsoft
Link: View this Written question on www.publications.parliament.uk