Dear Sir or Madam,

This request under the FOI Act is in relation to the Sunderland Software City initiative (http://www.sunderlandsoftwarecity.com) which One North East has provided funding to (see press releases: http://www.onenortheast.co.uk/page/news/... & http://www.onenortheast.co.uk/page/news/... & http://www.onenortheast.co.uk/page/news/...)

I would be grateful if you could provide the following details relating to this initiative for the financial years 2008/09 and 2009/10 together with a forecast for 2010/11:

- The name of the applicant applying for the funding
- The process followed for developing and approving this funding application and award of funding, eg copies of business case, appraisal documentation and invitation to tender documentation
- The legal entity that the funding has been provided to
- Amount of funding provided
- Total number of staff on payroll directly and solely involved in delivering this initiative and details of legal entity employing them
- Breakdown of overhead costs for operating this initiative
- Details where funding has been provided to a third party of the initiative together with process/tender documentation regarding the transfer of these funds
- Detail regarding outputs (eg NTF4, NTF6 etc.) that this initiative is contracted to deliver
- Detail of any potential conflict of interest regarding staffing (eg employee, executive and board members) recorded

Yours Faithfully,

James Burke

Dear Jaymes Glew,

Thank you for your reply dated 24th December 2009.

In relation to the original request and response provided I would be grateful if you could clarify/provide more detail on the following to allow completeness of this request:

- Provide breakdown of funding, overheads and outputs for the financial years 2008/09, 2009/10 and forecast for 2010/11
- Supply of documentation (eg copies of “business base, appraisal documentation” etc.) relating to the process followed for developing and approving this funding application(s) in accordance with the “Agency’s Business Process”

I would also be grateful if you could clarify the following in the reply to the above two points relating to the “Difference Engine” programme:

- Clarification of complete funding, overheads and outputs relating to the “Difference Engine” programme as per: http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/di...
- Clarification of process followed, together with related documentation, relating to the development of the “Difference Engine” programme from the original “white paper”: http://blog.thedifferenceengine.eu/blog/...

Yours sincerely,

James Burke

Dear Nicola Barnett,

Further to request by Nicola Barnett via email 10th May 2010 for clarification on FOI requests that are long overdue and not complete:

For info, business cases as received via this FOI request:
NE005325 - http://www.scribd.com/doc/31191462/NE005...
NE004134 - http://www.scribd.com/doc/31191571/NE004...
NE004801 - http://www.scribd.com/doc/31191588/NE004...
NE004802 - http://www.scribd.com/doc/31191595/NE004...

FOI response received via email 30th March 2010:
Further to your queries in the above letter relating specifically to the SSC/DEV/Difference Engine, please see the below responses from our client department.

1) Please clarify the discrepancy of £784,323
There is no discrepancy. The total funding for the entire SSC Enterprise Programme is £2,105,030.

2) Please clarify discrepancy in outputs from the business case and FOI response.
Again, there is no discrepancy. The 120 jobs created/safeguarded and 260 businesses supported/assisted/created were specifically related to SSC Enterprise and SSC Education and Innovation, as that is what the FOI request and response targeted.

3) Please confirm that no payments have been made to third party companies, consultants, or contractors.
No funding has been given in relation to this by the agency to third parties. The proposer as part of the project delivery may procure services subject to the necessary procurement process.

4) Please confirm that there is no perceived conflict in the same person taking a Board level role at ONE and that there is no perceived conflict in the same person taking the role of Chair of SSC Board and Advisory Boards whilst also having a Board role at ONE.
All Board Members are required to make declarations of interest. Paul Callaghan made a declaration at the Board meeting where SSC was discussed. As a result he stepped out of the room when the relevant item was discussed. This is standard practice where there is a conflict. Our declarations of interest for our website are currently being updated and the amended version will be on our website by the end of March.

5) Please clarify on what grounds it was decided that it was not necessary to procure
As it states in both the NE004134 and NE004801 Business Cases, “as this is a grant aid project to a non-profit organisation which was nominated by the project board as the key strategic partner, this is an appropriate response”.

Please provide clear and unambiguous clarifications for the following:
re: 1) & 2)
Business Cases NE004134, NE004081 and NE005325 received via FOI appear to provide different information to that provided in the FOI responses in relation to Single Programme funding and Outputs.
FOI response via email on the 30th March 2010 states "There is no discrepancy. The total funding for the entire SSC Enterprise Programme is £2,105,030." Business cases NE004134 & NE004081 & NE005325 appears to be £2,889,353.
Please clarify the actual Single Programme funding and Outputs contracted with clear, unambiguous reasons for any differences between actual and signed off business cases for SSC Enterprise and SSC Education and Innovation strands. If the clarification refers to business cases that have not been provided then please provide them.

re: 3) Please confirm that the procurement of all services, supplies and goods, including the tender specifications for the provision of any services to the BIC for this initiative, is fully compliant with this handbook (eg sufficient degree of advertising, tender design, conflicts of interests of consultants etc.), if not, please specify any departures from the procurement rules and reasons for these variations. Please also provide copies of tender documentation and details of award (company name and value of tender awarded).

re: 4) Please confirm that declarations on the website have been updated and date when they were updated. Please clarify any conflicts of interest that have been declared during any activity as per 3) and if none please clearly state none.

An incomplete response had been provided for "Total number of staff on payroll directly and solely involved in delivering this initiative and details of legal entity employing them", please provide a complete response.

The response to the "Breakdown of overhead costs for operating this initiative" for the "BIC overheads" was stated as £72,824. This figure seems incredibly low and does not appear to correlate with the business cases, eg one business case NE004134 appears to have overheads of c£593k excluding salaries. Please provide a clear and unambiguous response.

Yours sincerely,

James Burke

Dear Nicola Barnett,

I would be grateful if you clarify the last paragraph in your reply and specifically list all "outstanding related FOI requests" that you consider closed.

I would also be grateful if you could confirm, or otherwise, if you consider these requests to have already undergone an "internal review".

Yours sincerely,

James Burke

Dear Nicola Barnett,

Many thanks for the quick clarification.

I'd be grateful if you could reply to each of the links accordingly and separately so that it is clearer to read, review and hopefully close. It would also make it clearer for an independent review of each FOI request should that need arise.

Yours sincerely,

James Burke

Dear Nicola Barnett,

Can you confirm (and maybe copy & paste if correct) that this response actually relates to a different FOI request - eg this one? http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/pr...

Yours sincerely,

James Burke

Nicola,

OK, thank you.

I sent you an email this morning at 11:27 that contains the information below, all other "emails" relating to these FOI requests will have been generated from the website and should provide direct links within them that you can reply to.

Email as sent this morning:

"I’ve updated the related FOI requests on the “WhatDoTheyKnow” website as per the links below.

You and Jaymes Glew should have received automated email notifications as I replied via the website to the last reply.

Thanks,

James

Related links for reference:
http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/pr...
http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/di...
http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/su...
http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/we...

"

Yours sincerely,

James Burke

Dear Nicola Barnett,

Thank you for the response received today relating to the following paragraph in the request:

"An incomplete response had been provided for "Total number of staff on payroll directly and solely involved in delivering this initiative and details of legal entity employing them", please provide a complete response.""

I look forward to receiving responses to the remaining request (http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/su...)

Yours sincerely,

James Burke

Dear Nicola Barnett,

Further to a ONE North East Press Release today - http://www.onenortheast.co.uk/page/news/...

This press release states that over the last 12 months "£9.45m towards developing the Sunderland Software City initiative" has been provided via ERDF investment.

The business cases that have been provided in response to this FOI request dated 14th December 2009 (http://www.scribd.com/doc/31191571/NE004... & http://www.scribd.com/doc/31191588/NE004... & http://www.scribd.com/doc/31191595/NE004...) do not appear to correlate with this press release.

I can only assume therefore that incorrect, or incomplete information has been provided in response to this FOI request and I would be grateful if you could update with complete documentation for the Sunderland Software City initiative as originally requested.

Yours sincerely,

James Burke

Dear Jaymes Glew,

For info: please note that this FOI request (http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/su...) has had a new reply added today but an "out of office" reply has been provided.

Yours sincerely,

James Burke

Dear Nicola Barnett,

Thank you for the quick reply, I notice that the press release (http://www.onenortheast.co.uk/page/news/...) has been updated to now show £945,000 rather than the £9.5m as shown last week.

Yours sincerely,

James Burke

Dear Nicola Barnett,

The aim of this note is to provide a summary of the responses to this FOI request.

This FOI request and the responses from One North East have raised a number of issues.

Since 2008 One North East provided funding of £4,501,496 (including an additional £1,799,540 from ERDF) via 3 projects relating to "Sunderland Software City” (SSC) to the North East Business Innovation Centre (BIC) with no tender process. Bernie Callaghan is the CEO of the SSC initiative who is the brother of the current One North East Chairman Paul Callaghan who was recently appointed by Vince Cable. When One North East provided funding to the SSC Initiative Paul Callaghan was a One North East board member in addition to being Chair of the SSC Board and Advisory Boards and has “made a declaration at the Board meeting where SSC was discussed. As a result he stepped out of the room when the relevant item was discussed.” - http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/su...

Three business cases have been provided in response to the FOI request. The initial FOI responses and additional responses received after the supply of signed off business cases appear to show discrepancies in figures provided in the business cases (re: outputs, single programme costs, overheads etc.) and in the FOI response summaries. Clarifications sought about the differences in the figures appear to remain unclear, e.g. BIC overheads was stated as being £72,824 when one of the three business cases clearly shows overheads of c£593,000. A response of “no funding is provided to a third party” is provided yet sub-contracted activity appears to have been delivered by, and continues to be delivered by, a number of third parties.

Additionally, funding of £336,000 to deliver the “Difference Engine” project appears to have been awarded by One North East to the BIC to manage the project with again no tender process. A further £180,000 has been provided to support this project via the Design and Creative Fund (DCF) a Fund Managed by EDNE Ltd (a wholly owned subsidiary of One North East). The Difference Engine programme manager and DCF Fund Manager appear to be the same person who was recruited by the BIC in 2009 following a tender process carried out by the BIC for the provision of Project Management services for the Difference Engine programme. This tender process appears to have been carried out in breach of the ONE North East Single Programme and European Funding Procurement Handbook guidelines and which appears to be eligible for “clawback” of £134,000 (see http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/su...). Peter Judge, the One North East Head of Legal Services, is listed as a signatory on the One North East Business Case for the Difference Engine (previously known as has “The Cloud Foundry” http://www.scribd.com/doc/31191462/NE005...). Peter Judge Head of Legal Services at One North East was made fully aware, in April 2010, of the apparent procurement irregularities relating to the Difference Engine Programme Manager post the perceived numerous conflicts of interest relating to Jon Bradford etc. Peter Judge was also involved in the direct handling of various FOI requests and discussions at meetings relating to these issues. It is not clear that these issues have been addressed by One North east. Peter Judge has subsequently issued a Section 14(1) FOI refusal notice regarding FOI requests seeking further clarifications: (http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/su...). Further details regarding the Difference Engine procurement are available here: http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/th...

As a Section 14(1) refusal notice has been issued and upheld following an internal review by One North East (http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/su...) it appears that I am unable to seek further clarifications.
 

Yours sincerely,

James Burke