Speeches by McKinnell.

“But isn’t it an accepted principle that that governance arrangement would not really work for delivery? Or is it an accepted principle that it needs to be reviewed to find a better governance model, or the optimal governance model for delivery?”

“Okay, fine.”

“Are you saying that if these decisions are made in—your worst-case scenario—two years from today, that will enable the timeframe you are intending to work to?”

“The family I am talking about is just one of the many cases in my constituency. They have been trying to get answers since January. As a Committee, we have been trying to get answers for months. Why did we have to wait until the point of known and demonstrable contractual failure before work was done to rectify it? Why…”

“I want to follow up on a couple of those points. What would the consequences be of failing to process the McCloud contractual changes in time?”

“There are two aspects to this. One is the financial implications of all of this, which should be on Capita rather than the taxpayer and should be substantial enough to create the change that we need to see. There is also the outstanding question for families who are grieving this week and still dealing with this. Do yo…”

“I do not mean commercially; I mean legally.”

“That is really disappointing.”

“I am just anticipating our next inquiry and report in advance. I cannot get my head around why we are waiting another period to look at options for what should now happen when the writing was on the wall for this outcome six months ago, if not sooner. Can you explain why we are still waiting for even the options of wha…”

“That is not very reassuring, because they are the same people—the same people in your current backlog will end up in the McCloud backlog as well. In all likelihood, many of them will overlap. You talk about separate contracts, but as far as we are concerned, it is our constituents and it is the same people. We are just…”

“There are concerns that we are heading into the next crisis, which is the McCloud deadline. Presumably, under the contract you have entered into, given the situation you are currently in and the capacities you have, we need some reassurance that we will not just have the same thing again in six months’ time, with you n…”

“Are you confident that the AI and additional technological capacity will be there in the next two months to clear the backlog?”

“We have covered a lot, but I wanted to go back to the comment that you made about the surge teams. Being in a backlog situation rather than a capacity situation seems to be the exact scenario in which you would require a surge team. Because we are pressing on the cost of surge being transferred to Capita, rather than t…”

“If it does not deliver what you intend and what you hope, will you invest in additional surge capacity or additional capacity within your own teams to meet the demand and meet the promises you have made today to clear the backlog?”

“I have not had that with any organisation. People answer MPs when they represent their constituents, but Capita does not.”

“You are talking about recognition of the reputational damage, not to mention the damage to people’s lives. That is why I asked about the overspend. I think Capita needs to pick up the ticket for the failure to deliver on what was promised. No matter how much you explain how difficult it is and how complex the contract …”

“I am looking at the key performance indicators for the contract. Indicator 36 says that ill health retirement quotes should be provided three days from receipt of request. Given that is the target that Capita should be working towards, can you explain how on earth so many of the most urgent and most sensitive cases are…”

“Okay, but given the key performance indicators, what penalties have been levied for that breach in particular, which is so egregious and unforgivable?”

“You will be hearing from us.”

“As you will have heard, the Cabinet Office estimates that you will fail on 16 of the KPIs. I am not quite sure whether you have already failed, in terms of the deadline you have currently reached, or that the Cabinet Office has anticipated that you will fail. Can you clarify that? Can you also clarify what that means f…”