Hatred of Brexit led civil servants to ignore IT issues

CIVIL servants in a department crucial to Britain’s departure from the EU ignored IT problems and were “happy to see the system fail” because they hated Brexit, a whistleblower claimed.

The allegations were made by a former contractor to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) who worked in the EU exit unit of the department.

The whistleblower, who worked in IT, said that a new computer service contract was put in place after the 2017 General Election. But it was unable to deal with the department’s existing work, let alone the increased demands of Brexit, he claimed.

The whistleblower, who was based at Defra’s digital data and technology services department in Reading, said that as a result of his raising concerns about the computer system a contract extension was cancelled and he was blacklisted from government work.

He also claimed that senior managers in Defra did not hide their contempt for Brexit and Boris Johnson, insulting the Prime Minister in front of junior employees when he appeared on departmental television screens.

The claims have been denied by Defra. However, former environment secretary Theresa Villiers has confirmed to the Sunday Express that she held a meeting about the allegations while still in office and ordered an investigation.

Ms Villiers said: “I was shocked and I asked for an investigation immediately.”

She has also asked her successor George Eustice to ensure the investigation proceeds.

And the Sunday Express has been told that the new environment secretary has requested a meeting with senior Tory Andrew Bridgen and the whistleblower.

The whistleblower warned that a switch of service contract in 2017 meant the system could not cope with its then current responsibilities, such as processing farm subsidy payments.

This was before a further nine responsibilities were transferred from the EU to be dealt with by Defra.

The department changed the contract to one run by French tech giant Capgemini. But the new contract also downscaled the old, claimed the whistleblower, who said it was “like going from a Bentley to an old banger”.

An early sign of the chaos emerged when he arrived at Defra and asked to see the contract. After six weeks Defra was still unable to produce it.

In November 2019 a major incident took place at the department’s data centre in Telford, when another company logged on to a server owned by Capgemini and managed to break it.

Shortly after starting with the department in September 2019, the whistleblower was seconded to the EU exit team where he was shocked by the lack of preparation.

He said: “It became clear to me under Theresa May there actually was zero preparation for Brexit.”

He added: “Everything I experienced gave the impression that some senior civil servants in key roles were happy for the system to fail because of their dislike of Brexit.”

A Defra spokesman said: “These allegations are fundamentally untrue.”

‘Some senior civil servants in key roles were happy for the system to fail’