§ Mr. ChurchillTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department when the Home Office first embarked on the computerisation of the illegal immigrant suspect index; how much has been spent on the project to date; and when he expects the system to be fully operational.
§ Mr. Nicholas BakerA project team was resourced in late 1989 to develop the suspect index system, and commenced work in January 1990. Following approval of the business case, and a competitive procurement including technical design studies, a supply contract was let to ICL Ltd in December 1992. Development of the system began in January 1993. Capital costs in the order of £13.7 million will have been spent by the end of phase 1 of the project. The system commenced live running at Stansted airport and the Immigration Service intelligence114W and investigation unit near Heathrow airport on 23 January 1995. The first phase, which includes major ports of entry and enforcement offices, is planned to be completed in April 1995.
Further phases of the project are proposed to encompass remaining ports of entry, enforcement offices and other IND locations where system access is required by 1998.