Mr Bevis asked the Minister for Defence, upon notice, on 28 August 1997:

(1) Will the tender evaluation and decision in relation to the information technology facilities (CRISP) in the Russell redevelopment be undertaken by (a) his Department or (b) the prime contractor, Civil and Civic.

(2) Did the original request for tender (RFT) specify preferred solutions rather than performance criteria; if so, why.

(3) What processes were followed to produce the original RFT document.

(4) Did the original RFT fail to indicate details of evaluation criteria; if so, why.

(5) What are the evaluation criteria to be used for tender evaluation.

(6) When were potential suppliers provided with the evaluation criteria.

(7) What measures have been adopted to ensure the involvement of the small and medium size enterprises.

(8) Have existing purchasing arrangements, including the Defence Preferred Systems Integrators and PD50 contracts, been ignored; if so why.

(9) What procedures have been established to ensure that value for money rather than initial price will be applied in tender evaluation.

(10) Did the RFT omit direction as to which requirements are mandatory, highly desirable or desirable; if so, why.

(11) Is Civil and Civic required to provide his Department with the details of information technology systems for the redevelopment as a separate and distinct item.

(12) Is Civil and Civic required to provide his Department with details of the anticipated ongoing costs associated with the CRISP acquisition.

(13) Is Civil and Civic required to meet any ongoing costs associated with the CRISP environment; if so, for what period.

(14) Will the new CRISP IT environment replace existing older systems.

(15) Will it be necessary for some staff to have access to both the existing older systems and the new CRISP environment.

(16) What implication for office space and other relevant matters have been identified should it be necessary for both the older system and the CRISP system to be available for staff.

(17) Will tenders be considered by an acquisition council; if so, when (a) was the decision taken and (b) will the council make its recommendations.

(18) Is he able to say (a) which consultants were engaged by Civil and Civic to assist in writing the RFT and (b) whether the consultants have commercial links with the firms likely to tender for the project.

Mr McLachlan —The answer to the honourable member's question is as follows:

(1) Parallel but separate tender evaluations will be undertaken by the Department of Defence as the client, and by Civil & Civic as the managing contractor. The outcomes of this process will be considered by an Acquisition Council or like process with the Department of Defence making the final selection decision.

(2) The original tender did not specify preferred solutions, but sought proposals from industry which would position Defence to take advantage of future developments in information technology. Annex B to the original 415 page tender did contain a reference to a particular product. This error was rectified through an advice issued four days after the release of the tender.

(3) A Statement of Requirement was produced by Defence, and provided to the Managing Contractor, Civil & Civic as the Defence requirement for CRISP. Civil & Civic used this Statement of Requirement to develop a draft RFT which integrated CRISP with the overall Russell project. The draft RFT was then returned to Defence for agreement and clearance to Civil & Civic to release the RFT.

(4) Civil & Civic issued the tender in accordance with its contractual requirements to provide Defence with fully functional and integrated new and refurbished buildings at Russell Offices. As the Managing Contractor, it was a matter for Civil & Civic to determine the form of the tender documentation. It is not a Civil & Civic practice to issue evaluation criteria.

(5) Evaluation plans were established by Defence and Civil & Civic to assess technical merits of the bids against four criteria relating to the provision of a homogeneous network for the Russell buildings, migration of and ongoing support for legacy business applications, reduced ongoing support for the new environment and proven project management experience in the field of information technology integration. At the conclusion of the technical assessment, the financial aspects of the tenders will be considered, leading to a value for money assessment.

(6) The information contained in the answer to Question 5 was conveyed to potential suppliers at an industry briefing in mid-July 1997.

(7) The RFT requires each tenderer to identify the ANZ content of their proposals. The provisions of the Defence Preferred Systems Integrator panel contract maximises the involvement of Australian industry through teaming and/or partnership arrangements and will be utilised in the finalisation of the CRISP tender process.

(8) The tenders were issued by, and will be managed as sub-contracts to the prime contract by Civil & Civic. All of the companies on the Defence Preferred Systems Integrator and PD50 panels were invited to tender for the respective systems integration contract and the supply of desktop hardware.

(9) Standard Defence evaluation procedures lead to a decision based on value for money. Initial price is only one element of the evaluation.

(10) This tender did not use the concept of varying degrees of compliance. The tenderers were requested to provide a fully compliant solution.

(11) Yes. Each group of work packages associated with information systems, ie cabling, systems integration/migration and desktop products will be let as separate and distinct sub-contracts.

(12) Yes. Both the Civil & Civic and Defence evaluations will produce a selection which represents best value for money, taking into account ongoing costs during the contract period.

(13) The Statement of Requirement requires the system to be warranted, and software updating to be provided until 2001.

(14) CRISP will replace existing network systems and some desktop hardware and servers. CRISP will not replace existing Defence business application systems which will be migrated to the new environment.

(15) Once staff are established in the new buildings, CRISP will provide a new network system which will enable them to access existing migrated business applications.

(16) The older network systems being replaced by CRISP will not be available in the new buildings. These older systems will be retained in their existing location until migration to CRISP has been complete.

(17) Yes, Defence will form a panel comprising internal and external representatives, similar in nature to an acquisition council required under previous rules for high cost information technology acquisitions. Although the panel is only now being formed, the intention to do so had been under consideration prior to the release of tenders, as part of agreeing the tender evaluation methodology. The decision to adopt an acquisition council process was confirmed in mid-August. Its recommendations are expected in late September/early October.

(18) Civil & Civic employed Gus Koller and Associates to assist in writing the RFT. To the best of Defence's knowledge, Gus Koller and Associates has no commercial links with any of the firms invited to tender for the project. A commercial contract between Gus Koller and Associates and IBM, one of the prospective tenders, was terminated before work began on writing the RFT.