“The Palace of Westminster has agreed to provide 650 members of parliament with iPads, replacing their old laptops at a cost of at least £260,000 (around $420,000) to the taxpayer,” Matt Brian reports for TNW.
“iPads will only be provided to MPs that agree to trade-in their old laptops or computers, which could then be distributed to other staff in the House,” Brian reports. “The Register reports that the supervisory body that oversees administration in the House agreed to the plan yesterday, green-lighting a “rapid rollout” of iPads, allowing MPs expense their new Apple tablet purchases.”
Brian reports, “Apple’s iPad has been allowed in the House of Commons for over a year, helping politicians work on the move and reduce the amount of waste from printing… The Commons Commission has [also] said that if a hundred policitians returned their old computer equipment, then it would be able to save £50,000 in costs.”
Read more in the full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Dan K.” for the heads up.]
Related articles:
House of Commons Commission to rule on iPads for all MPs – March 26, 2012
British House of Lords allows peers use of Apple iPads – March 11, 2011
German Parliament scolds MP for being first to use Apple iPad during Bundestag speech – June 22, 2010
All 736 European Parliament members to get taxpayer-funded Apple iPads via £4.3m earmark – May 24, 2010
I wonder if, when pending legislation does not get debated before a legislative session ends, the bills are said to have ‘died on the order iPad”?
“Oh I say Jeeves, what’s this dashed tablet you have in your hand there?”
“What, what, what? Oh I say my good man, why it’s an iPad of course. What did you think it was? A tampon?”
“Of course not, Jeeves, do you think I’m thick? I’m a parliamentarian you know, an ass licker of the lowest kind.”
“Now where’s that wet behind the ears boy Cameron. I have six of the best to give him right on his royal ass.”
Looks like they’re still mired in the “old computers have value” paradigm. They will waste more money and time sorting out who gets which old PC and keeping that beast running than they would spend ditching the whole lot and getting a three year lease deal for new iMacs and iPads for all. I recall a Fox News affiliate in upstate New York putting iPads in their entire newsroom, fairly soon after they came out. They claimed the iPads paid for themselves within six months in avoided paper and copy costs for the scripts. A paper mill like a legislative body should turn the trick in 3-5 days.
I watched the sorting of old assets game, including “whose buddy gets the least pitiful last gen PC”. The cost of the staff required to do the sorting had to be greater than just getting new hardware across the board. Funny thing was they had to pry the last remaining Mac 512s from the hands of those fortunate enough to have them. Finally started approaching a rational solution with leased equipment, renewed every three years with a 30-day rollout of upgrades to all.
The Brits need to realize that their computing equipment will never be as out of date as their central heating, no matter how hard they try. Just go get the good stuff.
My central heating is just fine, thanks very much.
Sorry.
Oh shoot!…
Please form an orderly queue to post your Brit bashing jokes – starting with outmoded dumb sociological caricatures , references to bad plumbing , bad teeth, poor food, a nation of commies, ‘it always rains here’ etc etc
Of course the real challenge would be to come up with something original, intelligent and truly funny.
🙂
You’ll sooner find a turtle with a mustache.
It was said with affection. And it was about not trying to save old computers with the misapprehension that it saves money somehow. Didn’t realize I was going to be so controversial. I see I need to freshen my material.