Vol. 456 No. 2
64 Mr. Martin asked the Minister for Education the reason only one software company and its software programme have been chosen for the computerised pupil data project for second level schools; and the reason an alternative programme (details supplied) was not chosen by her Department. [13616/95]
My Department placed an advertisement in the European Journal in May 1992, inviting all interested suppliers to tender for the provision of software for processing pupil data. Five tenders were received in response to this invitation. Following a detailed valuation exercise, one of these was chosen to provide software for second-level schools in 1992. The software package to which the Deputy refers was not chosen as tests carried out in my Department showed it to be unable to meet the specified technical requirements. This was also the position when the package was retested in 1994. Following discussions with the Department the company concerned decided not to resubmit the package for testing in 1995.
