Alan argues for central purchasing of communications:
> Firstly the organisation reduces its contract negotiation/ management
> bureacracy.
I don't find this plausible. WHat happens is that central purchasing
gets centralised further and you end up with the centre arguing that the
whole NHS should buy its communications on a single contract. Enter NHS
network, stage right, with the enormous costs that Ahmad and others have
been pointing out.
Meanwhile you get a fantastic proliferation of communications management
groups.
If the rule were that each trust will have one (1) person responsible inter
alia for purchasing phone, network, alarm and other communication services
- or better still, no rule at all, with no central oversight of how the
trusts bought their comms - then it strikes me that the amount of bureaucracy
would be very very much less.
> it may be more easier to watch over one supplier's security &
> confidentiality arrangements than it would be with six.
Safety and privacy are attriibutes of end systems, not of the network (except
insofar as safety includes the reliability aspects, and even there you benefit
from being able to tear up your BT contract and moving to Mercury)
Ross
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