The Government's flagship €26 million e-government project has been criticised by an independent report for failing to deliver on its original promises and for being too focused on technology.
It found that the Reach project, which aims to create a one-stop-shop for all State services, would end up being "highly disappointing" unless the Government intervened immediately to change how the project was being managed.
It also warned that the nature and magnitude of the project had been "ill-defined and poorly understood".
The independent review, which was commissioned by Reach, was forwarded to the Department of Finance earlier this year. The report has yet to be acted on.
Five years ago the Government promised a one-stop-shop system where people could use the internet, telephone or high street information offices to carry out transactions such as paying tax and renewing passports.
The review found that the Reach project had instead "unwittingly been whittled down" to a technology project and reflected a wider problem of preoccupation with technological change at the expense of other aspects.
"The role of information and communication technologies is not appreciated by senior government executives and that many public servants do not understand e-government."
This pointed to "major challenges ahead" if the Reach project, also called the Public Services Broker, was to be fully realised.
According to the report by Joe McDonagh, a management and information technology expert based in Trinity College Dublin, the Reach project had succeeded in building the public service broker technology on which the one-stop-shop system could be based.
However, the technology was unlikely to deliver a comprehensive service unless the entire approach to the project was changed away from an exclusive focus on technology.
The report recommended additional resources, planning and a body to oversee the project.
The Department of Finance declined to state what action had been taken on foot of the report.
A department spokesman said that on-line and telephone services were being delivered at present by individual agencies.
"Where Reach are at now, the primary emphasis has to be on the delivery of the technology which will underpin many systems being implemented and planned across the public service."
Reach was one of a number of technology-focused projects to come under focus in the wake of the P-Pars controversy last month.
The project was launched five years ago and to date, €26 million has been spent on developing technology to allow State agencies to store and pass information.
About €18 million of the spending has been on outside consultants who were brought in to augment a small staff of 11 civil servants working on the project.
The system was originally to have been up and running by the end of 2003, but various delays and funding issues have caused delays of up to two years.
There are still no definitive plans for a call centre based on the technology, which was promised as part of the scheme.