§ The Earl of Northeskasked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether open source software solutions for public sector information technology projects, as endorsed by the Office of Government Commerce, were considered as an alternative to the recently announced nine-year contract with Microsoft for software for the National Health Service. [HL114]
§ Lord WarnerThe Department of Health fully supports the open source software initiative, and the National Programme for Information Technology has evaluated the suitability of a number of particular solutions for deployment in the National Health Service in England. However, these solutions were not 19WA considered sufficiently robust for front-line working across the NHS. An additional powerful consideration in favour of the Microsoft deal is that there is already an installed base of around 600,000 Microsoft-based computers in use in the NHS.
§ The Earl of Northeskasked Her Majesty's Government:
What will be the licensing costs of the recently announced nine-year contract with Microsoft for software for the National Health Service contract; and how these would compare, had an open source solution been adopted. [HL115]
§ Lord WarnerDetails of the costs involved are subject to commercial confidentiality, but they compare favourably with any commercially-available open source solution, even without taking into account the cost that would be required to develop the open source products to the industrial strength required for front-line National Health Service use.