Guernsey's Chief Minister admits the States 'failed and missed chances' to prevent IT outages

Guernsey's Chief Minister has admitted that chances were missed to stop the widespread States' IT problems that disrupted public services for months.

Deputy Peter Ferbrache says "there should have been proper maintenance" to an air conditioning unit that broke and caused a server room to overheat in November 2022 as it had first failed five months earlier.

No data was lost but the issues between November and January did affect a number of areas such as internet access in schools, Guernsey Airport's boarding card system and benefit payments.

"There was a human error or a series of human errors," he revealed.

"There are failings we must acknowledge and actions that were missed that could have prevented these outages."

It comes as an independent report lays bare a number of problems and subsequent recommendations to urgently improve the States' IT systems.

"The review further highlights the need for a better, more resilient IT infrastructure and that we must get there faster," Mr Ferbrache added.

The report highlights that the risk of something going wrong is unacceptable and there was no disaster recovery plan for IT legacy systems.

Mr Ferbrache confirmed the States will continue to work with technology firm Agilisys to overhaul its digital infrastructure - having signed a £200 million contract in 2019 - but the company may need to shoulder some of the bills to make things right.

"If it turns out that Agilisys are responsible for any of the costs that have been incurred we would look to them to recompense us in some way," Mr Ferbrache explained.

He pushed the need for greater resources to be prioritised for system improvements as part of the Government Work Plan, including more staff and extra support from third-party companies.

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