Departmental Internet

Justice written question – answered at on 13 July 2009.

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Photo of Tom Watson Tom Watson Member, Labour Party National Executive Committee

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice when his Department plans to update its web browsers from Internet Explorer 6.

Photo of Michael Wills Michael Wills Minister of State, Ministry of Justice, The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice

The Department has commenced the upgrade of Internet Explorer from version 6 to version 7. Internet Explorer 6 is still supported by Microsoft, and the upgrade to version 7 is planned to be completed prior to Microsoft ceasing to support Internet Explorer 6.

With respect to individual business areas, the upgrade from version 6 to version 7 has commenced in the HQ areas of the former Department for Constitutional Affairs (DCA). This will be completed by the end of October 2009. Approximately 1,800 PCs within the Legal Services Commission (LSC) will be upgraded by the end of March 2010, bringing all their computers up to version 7. Plans to upgrade Her Majesty's Courts Service are currently being considered. Meanwhile, staff will continue to use the Microsoft supported Internet Explorer version 6.

Within the National Offender Management Service (NOMS), version 6 of Internet Explorer is being deployed to staff within the probation service on the OMNI network as part of their contractual agreement with their IT supplier. They are considering the upgrade path to Internet Explorer 7, as part of the wider strategy of convergence of the infrastructure.

For staff within Her Majesty's Prison Service, an exercise is under way to upgrade from version 6 to version 7 as part of the Quantum Infrastructure Improvement Programme. This exercise is currently in the planning stage and work is under way to validate this plan which currently anticipates the main deployment of version 7 taking place between mid-2010 and 2011. Tactical upgrades may occur as required.

NOMS staff that use the NOMSnet service (primarily regional offender managers) are already operating at version 7.

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