THE cost of the police's computer integration project could rise to £60 million, with staff redundancies costing up to £6m.
Police and fire control rooms around the country are also facing closure and some could be shared between the two emergency services, Police Scotland Chief Constable Sir Stephen House warned.
Sir Stephen told Holyrood's Justice Sub-Committee on Policing his flagship ICT integration project – known as i6 – was more than just a computer upgrade. "We are pitching this as a change programme as i6 will cover 80% of the police's operational activity, so this is absolutely massive as far as the organisation is concerned," he said.
The Scottish Government initially predicted ICT integration would cost £12m in the first three years, but this soon emerged as an underestimate.
Last week, First Minister Alex Salmond revealed i6 would cost £46m over 10 years, but yesterday the total cost was put at around £60m once its whole impact is factored in, including redundancies.
A spokesman for police civilian oversight body the Scottish Police Authority said its board was only informed about the extra costs at a meeting in Lockerbie on Wednesday.
"Police Scotland's business case outlines the financial cost of i6 at £46m a year," the SPA spokesman said. "There is also a wider economic cost associated with developing this programme, with an example being redundancies. This only came out in questioning at the SPA meeting yesterday, that there was somewhere up to £6m at a future point which may be required as this new computer system is put in place.
"Obviously it will require not just fewer people in IT to deal with it but also in the admin and constant rekeying. Along with all of the other things the total economic cost is something in excess of £60m over that 10-year period."
Sir Stephen yesterday outlined the savings i6 would make: "The cashable savings are over £61m and the total cashable and non-cashable savings are estimated to be £218m over 10 years."
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