THE entire computer network of Liverpool City Council crashed after a power failure yesterday.

Thousands of council workers were left unable to access emails or documents after the lunchtime system failure, bringing work to a standstill.

Many also suffered problems with their telephone lines, particularly within the main Municipal Buildings on Dale Street.

A back-up system also failed prompting the evacuation of Municipal Buildings at one point.

Engineers were expected to be working through the night in a bid to repair the computer systems.

The council said it was too soon to say whether data had been lost but that it was a “possibility”.

Members of the public ringing the council’s Liverpool Direct call centre were told to only stay on the line if their call was “urgent”.

It is believed the Echo Arena’s booking systems, which are run on the same servers at the council, were also hit by the power cut.

Its website was last night down “for urgent maintenance”.

Some workers were sent home by managers as the power failure continued into the afternoon.

The crash comes just a week after the council agreed to extend its £70m-a-year contract for IT provision with BT through the Liverpool Direct Ltd (LDL) joint venture.

The system failure meant staff at the LDL call centre were unable to log queries from the public. Around 5,000 people a day call the centre on issues ranging from refuse collections and housing repairs to council tax benefits.