The three Councils parted company, reaching separate deals after two of the councils appointed legal advisers. The eventual cost was around £300,000 higher than the original partnership estimate.

According to The Herald, a senior local government source said that the trio had missed a prime opportunity to save taxpayers a fortune. "This is exactly why there needs to be leadership and guidelines - rules of engagement," the source said. "But this has to come from ministers, as allowing councils to do this on a voluntary basis hasn't worked so far."

Each of the authorities involved issued statements saying they had been unable to proceed with the tendering due to differing requirements, and that a stand-alone solution was the only viable option.

David Whitton, Labour's public services spokesman, said: "There must be common ground where systems can be bought collaboratively."

Council collaboration on IT projects concerning national customer relations management in 2007 took Lagan as its preferred supplier for CRM, through The Improvement Service, a body responsible for improving the efficiency, quality and accountability of public services in Scotland.

The initial phase of the National CRM Project was to be implemented across four councils Aberdeen City, Inverclyde, Scottish Borders and West Lothian, which serve a total of more than half a million citizens.

The four councils then expected the collaborative partnership to realise significant efficiency savings, combined with improved service delivery with the project  being coordinated by the Scottish Executive funded Customer First programme. Its website has issued no newsletter since 2007. 

Sources: http://www.theherald.co.uk
http://www.crescentcapital.co.uk/
Scottish collaborative projects:http://tinyurl.com/7kutu4
http://www.improvementservice.org.uk/core-programmes/customer-first/
http://tinyurl.com/4rurzu