Please help me with the 2 questions of th case study. Very simple answer needed and no word limitations. Illustration 8.3 Outsourcing - a broken model?Outsourcing Cambridge University Hospitals Trust's patient record system.It seemed a good idea for the UK-based Cambridge Univer- often lack the necessary professional judgement, technicalsity Hospitals Trust to outsource its patient records system. experience and practical skills to assess complex contracts soThe current system of circulating paper notes to a limited private companies with expensive lawyers are advantaged.number of users, mainly GPs, took time and money. Mindful Particularly difficult are contracts for social services withof pressures upon funding, turning paper data into anelectronic database accessible by hand-held devices in realtime, and cheaper to operate, was very attractive. However driven by profit than good service, but there are also manythe Trust did not have expertise in-house and so turned toexternal provider, US software company, Epic, to design andbuild a new electronic patient record system, e-Hospital, for work or by arguing over specification. In addition, there are£200m. It went live in 2014 and then the troubles started,qualitative and complex outcomes that are often hard toassess. Maybe not surprisingly private contractors are moreinstances of them obtaining contracts through bidding lowand subsequently raising prices by increasing the amount ofexamples in social care that they pay their employees lessAccident and emergency performance fell by 20 per than the minimum wage.cent in two years and the system produced inaccuratedischarge information, meaning patients might not receivethe right sort of care afterwards. There were also prob-lems providing timely information to patients and varioushealthcare professionals. Reasons given for these problems cleaning contracts that became unviable when there wereincluded staff confusion over the new system and difficul-ties in getting locum cover because they were not familiarwith the system and therefore became harder and moreexpensive to find. The difficulties became so serious thatthe Trust ended up in 'special measures' due to the financial home care services, as Allied Healthcare may cease servicesproblems. A report by the county's Clinical Commissioning when a loan payment becomes due. Over 40 per cent of localGroup concluded: 'The Trust underestimated the scaleand challenges of implementing its new electronic patient larly those relating to IT and technology. However, duringrecord system, e-Hospital, and the impact this would haveon its provision of healthcare for its patients. These issues technical resources. Going forwards in lower skilled, moreled to significant cost increases and a failure to realise the labour-intensive jobs, costs can only be reduced throughbenefits the system could provide.The Trust was not alone in experimenting withoutsourcing. Many local authorities have seen their budgetscut by as much as 40 per cent since 2010 and are strugglingto reduce costs and improve efficiency. It is estimated theyhave outsourced £120bn per year of services to private 1. Jolly, The Guardian, 6 November 2018.companies to save money and improve efficiency. Butinstead costs have gone up, and complications have ensued Questionswith notorious disasters such as G45's problems with securityat the London Olympics, that forced the army to step in, thecollapse of Southern Cross, Britain's largest care home oper-ator and the crash of a £10bn NHS upgrade. Local authoritiesMaybe the outsourcing model in public services is brokenwith the collapse of corporate behemoth Carillion with£1.5bn in debts and just £29m in cash in 2018. Carillion hadunderbid for thousands of school meal, hospital and courtdelays and costs overruns. Now another major providerCapita has issued a profits warning and the Care QualityCommission has written to 84 local authorities telling themthat as many as 9,300 elderly people are at risk of losingauthorities have now 'in-sourced' their contracts, particu-the outsourcing period many ran down their expertise andlower wages, worse conditions and fewer employees.Sources: K. de Freytas-Tamura, The Independent, 6 February 2018;R. Mulgan, Sunday Morning Herald, 27 April 2017; J. Super, FinancialTimes, 9 February 2018; G. Burton, Computing, 26 April 2017; Editorial,The Observer, 4 February 2018; L. Presser, The Guardian, 2 March 20163;1 Why do local authorities outsource?2 What are the problems with outsourcing?

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Outsourcing: Outsourcing refers to the way in which business organizations avail the services of a…

Questions 1 Why do local authorities outsource? 2 What are the problems with outsourcing?