THERE was no clear justification for the botched IT project that left Scotland’s public-sector pensions body with a £23 million budget gap, a watchdog says.

An attempt to integrate systems and save money at the Scottish Public Pensions Agency (SPPA) closed last February after supplier Capita failed to provide the goods.

The agency handles the retirement case for more than 500,000 NHS workers, teachers, police officers and firefighters.

The SPPA had already spent £6.3m on the project before pulling the plug at the cost of an additional £2.4m.

Now Caroline Gardner, the Auditor General for Scotland, says the agency has been left with a £23m gap in its revenue and capital budget over the next five years as a result of the computer bungle.

This is despite a lump sum of £700,000 recovered from Capita after legal action.

An Audit Scotland report released today tells how the body requires another £9.8m in revenue before 2022-23 and capital allocations of £13.6m over the next five years after the project disrupted its strategic, business and workforce plans.

The report states that the SPPA failed to “prepare a clear business case” and set an “unrealistic” 18-month timescale at a time when the agency was “going through significant change”.

Capita was appointed despite its bid being “abnormally low” and changes in SPPA and project leadership made it harder to manage the supplier and “hold it to account”.

The Audit Scotland report states: “SPPA did not have enough assurances over Capita’s ability to deliver the project before it awarded it the contract.”

Gardner said: “The public sector is under pressure and we are seeing more instances of bodies embarking on IT projects without the necessary staff and assurance arrangements in place to manage them properly.

“In this instance, I found no evidence of a clear business case for a new integrated system, which was pursued at a time when the SPPA was going through significant change. The result was a project that failed to provide value for money and has considerably set back the SPPA’s planning.”

Tory pensions spokesman Bill Bowman commented: “This is yet another botched IT contract on the SNP’s watch, and it’s costing the taxpayer millions of pounds.

“The nationalists should have learned lessons from similar failings with farming payments, NHS 24 or even Police Scotland.”

The SPPA’s existing IT supplier contracts have been extended to 2024 and it is making new efforts to improve its administration and payroll system and set up web portals to allow account holders to access their pension details online.

The SPPA did not respond to a request for comment.