Government and IT - "a recipe for rip-offs". Time for a new approach - Public Administration Committee Report Published
Public relations and public affairs in the ICT sector
The Public Administration Select Committee has today published its report into Government IT: Government and IT – “a recipe for rip-offs”: time for a new approach.
This detailed report on the use of IT within Government notes that Governments record on developing and implementing new IT systems is appalling. It comments that “the lack of IT skills in government and an over-reliance on contracting out is a fundamental problem which has been described as a “recipe for rip-offs”.
It goes on to say that it is ridiculous that in these austere times, some departments spend an average of £3,500 on a desktop PC.
The report found that government is currently over-reliant on a small “oligopoly” of large suppliers, which some witnesses referred to as a “cartel” which has led to a perverse situation in which governments have wasted an obscene amount of public money. Benchmarking studies have demonstrated that government pays substantially more for IT when compared to commercial rates.
It recommends that Government end this relationship by:
1. Improving its own information about IT, which is described as “woefully inadequate”.
2. Publishing more information, about costs and contracts, and also how systems run.
3. Widening the supplier base, by promoting fair and open competition and engaging with innovative SMEs. It must also adopt common standards and ensure that systems interoperate to eliminate over-reliance on a small group of suppliers, and commoditise where possible.
4. Working in an ‘agile’ manner which enable IT programmes to adapt to changes.
The report also stresses that the skills and expertise of in-house staff must be improved to manage suppliers and understand the potential IT has to transform the services it delivers. Outsourcing has left this severely lacking to date.
Finally, they outline their own vision for how the delivery of public services online could be reformed through a combination of data release, giving individuals control of their own personal records, engaging users in the design and continuous improvement of services and opening up the delivery of online services to a greater range of organisations.
A full copy of the report can be found here and the Government response will be released in due course.
