HT-2020-000448 - [2024] EWHC 1185 (TCC)

By the conclusion of evidence, it was clear that there was less between the two IT experts than might first have appeared.

TCS relied upon the expert evidence of Mr Mark Britton, an experienced consultant specialising in the assurance of IT delivery projects BAU systems management. The evidence given by Mr Britton dealt with not just the IT-related technical evidence, such as the nature of infrastructure design, role of a systems integrator, and whether TCS complied with good industry practice, but also the detail of TCS’s delay case both in terms of the identification of what he considered to be the critical path through the project on the basis of his assessment of the Microsoft Project Plans, and the causes and extent of delays. I have no doubt as to the relevant experience of Mr Britton, and whilst it was put to him, fairly, that there is relatively limited reference to his involvement in analysing programme delays within projects, I accept that he had sufficient project experience to provide his opinion on programming matters. However, as will become clear, Mr Britton adopted what was effectively a prospective delay analysis which I do not consider to be either justified by the demands of the Agreement or was likely to prove reliable as a basis of identifying the actual causes of delay on the project. Ultimately, neither of his two delay analyses was particularly useful in discerning the actual durations and causes of critical delay on the project. As will become apparent, whilst there are a number of aspects of Mr Britton’s evidence which I accept as correct, there are some matters, in respect of which I reject his conclusions in favour of those of Dr Hunt (in relation to technical matters) and Mr Jardine (in relation to programming matters).

DBS relied upon the technical expertise of Dr Gill Hunt, whose CV, and indeed oral evidence, evidenced extensive experience in software and IT services and the delivery of major IT replacement projects such as the one this litigation relates to. I consider that Dr Hunt gave her evidence in a scrupulously fair way, and in her evidence she agreed or disagreed with the propositions put to her as she considered to be technically correct, irrespective of whether that did or did not favour the case of her client. Dr Hunt did not carry out any sort of delay analysis comparable to Mr Britton’s (that being done, for DBS, by the delay analyst, Mr Jardine). She did, however, comment upon dependencies and the technical causes of delays. Notwithstanding her obvious credibility, it will become clear that in certain respects I remained unpersuaded by her conclusions, particularly when it became apparent (and when she often fairly conceded) that the material upon which she relied for her conclusions was limited.