Barnet is running its own IT from 1 October after a £6.2m contract award was abandoned. Capita's whole IT workforce transfers to the council under TUPE.

Barnet will run its own IT service from Wednesday 1 October, and every member of Capita’s IT workforce on the council’s contract transfers to the council on the same day. The decision closes the last large piece of an outsourcing arrangement that began in September 2013.

It was taken on 3 September by the Leader, Councillor Barry Rawlings, under urgent action powers, in consultation with Councillor Simon Radford, the cabinet member for financial sustainability. The Chair of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee agreed it was urgent, which means it was exempt from call-in: no committee could pause it.

The decision authorises the executive director for strategy and innovation to insource IT End User and Infrastructure Managed Services from 1 October, and to handle “the implementation of TUPE and transition for the whole workforce from incumbent supplier, Capita Business Services Ltd, to London Borough of Barnet”.

The procurement that did not survive contact with the market

This was not the plan Cabinet approved in February. That plan was a hybrid: keep the strategy in-house, buy the service from a supplier.

  • 24 February 2026: Cabinet delegated authority to award new IT contracts and ran a mini competition under the Crown Commercial Service framework RM6190 Technology Services 4, Lot 3.4.
  • 22 May 2026: the council awarded the IT managed services contract to Ultima Business Solutions Limited, for three years at £6,151,621, with an option to extend by two years taking the five-year total to an estimated £10,090,758. The decision was published on 24 June and records the contract as due to start on 1 October 2026.
  • 19 August 2026: the council abandoned the procurement, on legal advice from HB Public Law.
  • 3 September 2026: the Leader authorised insourcing instead.

The September report explains what went wrong, without naming the firm in that passage. “The Council’s preferred bidder sought to substantially increase its submitted bid costs post submission and evaluation,” it says. That was not allowed under procurement law or the framework’s terms. The bidder was told to stand by its original bid or withdraw by a deadline. “The bidder did not do this, and its bid was subsequently rejected by the Council.” The council’s own decision register records Ultima Business Solutions Limited as the awardee of that procurement.

The report is candid that this was a risk the council had already written down. When Cabinet chose a hybrid model, it noted “the risk that it could be hard to find a partner to offer the right model”. The September report says that risk “has materialised and needs to be mitigated”.

Timeline of Barnet's IT outsourcing: September 2013 Capita CSG contract begins, 2023 to 2025 nine services return in-house, 24 February 2026 Cabinet approves procurement, 22 May 2026 contract awarded to Ultima for £6,151,621, 19 August 2026 procurement abandoned, 3 September 2026 Leader authorises insourcing, 30 September 2026 Capita contract expires, 1 October 2026 IT service and staff transfer to the council
Graphic by Barnet Live
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What it costs

Nothing extra, on the council’s account of it. The report says the insourcing cost “is now confirmed as being within the current cost and budget envelope and consistent with the market response”, and that there are “no direct financial implications arising from this report, as the cost of insourcing the service is in line with the existing contract cost”.

That matters for a council under a government-backed financial sustainability review. For scale, February’s Cabinet report valued the remaining Capita contracts at about £19.4m a year, plus roughly £3.1m of variable costs such as IT consumables on 2024/25 figures.

The report also lists what the council gives up. Social value commitments offered in the tender “will not be delivered in full”, because there is no longer a supplier to deliver them. And two risks stay on the books: a standalone in-house service is a single point of failure, and it has less ready access to outside development and innovation. A mitigation plan is promised to the cross-party member reference group set up in November 2024 to watch the Capita review.

Cyber security stays outsourced, on purpose

The 24/7 Security Operations Centre contract with Maple Network Ltd is separate and is not affected. The report argues the two are different kinds of work: the security centre is “a clearly defined specialist service, with focused responsibilities, measurable outcomes and direct Council oversight”, while running the wider IT estate is not. Insourcing the rest, it says, gives the council “clearer accountability, greater control over security decisions” when working with its cyber partner.

Thirteen years, unwound in stages

Barnet’s Capita contracts date from September 2013 and have been coming back piece by piece.

  • 2023 to 2025: planning, highways, environmental health, estates, building services, facilities, print, HR and finance all returned to council control.
  • October 2022: the welfare support team came back in-house. The council says it has since supported more than 20,000 financially vulnerable residents through its money worries campaign, and that a benefits calculator put an extra £20m into residents’ pockets.
  • April 2025: the Colindale-based customer services team returned, and became Connect Barnet, which the council says supported more than 6,000 residents in 2025 with drop-ins at Burnt Oak, Chipping Barnet and East Finchley libraries.
  • 30 September 2026: the remaining Customer Support Group contracts, covering IT, customer services, and revenues and benefits including business rates, expire.

What it means for you

  • Nothing should change on 1 October for residents. The council’s own report says no external consultation was needed because the decision “does not involve a change to service provision, policy, or delivery arrangements that would impact residents or stakeholders”. It is a change of employer for the staff, not a change of service.
  • Council systems are the thing to watch. The transition covers the council’s end-user devices and infrastructure, so any wobble would show up in online forms, phone lines and portals rather than in a press release. If you have a deadline that depends on a council system in early October, do not leave it to the last day.
  • No equality impact assessment was done. The report says none was needed because the decision concerns continuation of statutory services.
  • The decision must go back to full Council. Urgent decisions exempt from call-in have to be reported by the Monitoring Officer to the next available meeting, with the reasons for urgency. That is the next chance for questions in public.
  • Bills, benefits and refuse are unaffected by this decision. For the practical pages, see Barnet council tax bands and bin collection days.

What we could not confirm

February’s Cabinet report covered three services: IT, customer services, and revenues and benefits. This decision covers IT only. Barnet Live searched the council’s published decision register today and could not find award decisions for the other two, so what happens to them on 1 October is not on the public record yet. Barnet’s own website is unreachable to us because of its bot protection, so every fact above comes from the council’s committee and decision records instead.

Sources: Leader’s Urgent Action Decision, 3 September 2026 and its report, IT End User and Managed Infrastructure - Authorisation to In-house Service Provision; contract award decision to Ultima Business Solutions Limited, 22 May 2026; abandonment of the procurement, 19 August 2026; Review and Transition of Capita Contracts, Cabinet, 24 February 2026.