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UK: Ahead in a Cloud |
| Source: |
publicservice.co.uk |
| Source Date: |
Thursday, July 14, 2011 |
| Focus: |
ICT for MDGs
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| Country: |
Europe |
| Created: |
Jul 14, 2011 |
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Between 2008 and 2009 over £16bn was spent by the public sector on
ICT. Launching the new government ICT strategy, Cabinet Office
Minister Francis Maude declared that for too long the government has wasted vast
amounts of money on ineffective and duplicative ICT systems.
Addressing this, the minister unveiled plans for the public sector to share and
re-use ICT solutions and services by using a common ICT structure, otherwise
known as G-Cloud.
The Cabinet Office has tasked the Local Chief
Information Office (CIO) Council with leading a local perspective on the
government ICT strategy, 'Planting the Flag'. In an interview with Public
Service Review's Laura Ferguson, Chief Information Officer at Leeds City Council
Dylan Roberts examines how central government ICT policy is likely to influence
delivery of local authority ICT and services.
"Cuts levied against local
government were particularly front loaded," he explains. "As such, the
opportunity for local authorities to uphold quality services and meet the cuts
by reconfiguring and joining-up local public services across place was absent.
The forthcoming local public service ICT strategy will provide an outline on how
these efficiencies can be made, by installing an ICT structure that will aid the
delivery of services."
The strategy will articulate how local public
services will deliver the following:
• Significantly more value from ICT – a
revolution in the way that people and employees interact with local public
services using digital forms of communication to achieve desired outcomes;
•
Significantly lower unit costs of ICT – reduced costs through aggregated
procurement, standardisation and common, shared infrastructure, networks and
applications delivered through an appropriate mix of local, sub-regional,
regional and national solutions.
"From a local perspective, our
definition of G-Cloud is about the adoption of cloud principles in all that we
do, about shared infrastructure and consolidating data centres as much as it is
about consuming applications and services from private cloud providers,"
continues Roberts. "For instance, at Leeds we are already working with a number
of partners to join up delivery of ICT services."
The ICT professionals
association Socitm has suggested the recent government strategy fails to
recognise the scope and opportunity for innovation and efficiency that can be
delivered locally across traditional local public service organisational
boundaries, instead focusing on big national framework contracts and a top down
approach to ICT.
"Price points are typically dictated by the government
as a whole," says Roberts. "However, through work carried out with Socitm, we
have found that local government ICT costs are much lower than the central
government ICT. Information Technology in Leeds only accounts for
1.22% of
overall operational spend. Central government departments tend to spend more due
to their reliance on big outsource contracts with integrators."
One of
the greatest challenges G-Cloud presents is whether services can be delivered by
private providers, at a price point sufficiently compelling for local as well as
central government. Roberts believes there is much to be learnt from
cost-effective local ICT.
"If national frameworks and programmes hold
value for us at a local level, then we will use them," Roberts states. "If they
do not, then we will potentially look to procure our own – one size does not
always fit all. The local public service approach taken on Public Service
Networks (PSN) and G-Cloud will be to source the appropriate mix of services
from local, regional and national frameworks/contracts as appropriate. By
following a multi-source approach councils will be able to have the optimum mix
of providers delivering against outcomes."
Where the Cloud concept
begins, concerns regarding security are sure to follow. Critics have implied
that G-Cloud provides even less security than present systems and ultimately
jeopardises the safety of data held by local government.
"The benefit of
G-Cloud as opposed to standard Cloud applications is that they will be accessed
via a PSN compliant network, developed in partnership with CESG," describes
Roberts. "As such, connection to these will be subject to compliance to codes of
connection and information assurance standards. Therefore, G-Cloud will be
hosted 'in government for government' with the associated
security."
Roberts is clear that for a strong local ICT network to take
shape there firstly needs to be a robust network of Central Information Officers
(CIOs) and heads of ICTs across local government and the public sector.
Upholding ICT professionalism is integral to build on internal capability and
reduce reliance on contractors.
"If a joined-up and integrated
'pan-local' or 'pan-public sector' ICT is to be successful, then there needs to
be common competency frameworks for ICT professionals," he says.
Although
the government advocates breaking up ICT projects into smaller manageable chunks
through 'agile' methods, there is still much debate on whether this can be
realised. Roberts recognises that boundaries and protectionism are the biggest
barriers currently facing the advancement of, and joined-up delivery of, local
government ICT.
"If we are going to provide joined-up services, then
there needs to be a more joined-up approach," urges Roberts. "In an ideal world
I would like to see people developing and delivering ICT strategies not based on
the silos of different organisations, such as health or voluntary sectors, but
on the needs of a whole. If we become 'pan-local' by joining up services with
partners across place, then we can save a significant amount of money by
aggregating and de-duplicating people, processes and
technologies."
Government aspirations for IT-enabled service efficiency
and technology consolidation are plausible. However, care needs to be taken to
ensure these ambitions are not compromised by a top-down structure, which has
long characterised government ICT. As Roberts suggests, central government can
learn a great deal from local government practices. Local heads of IT also need
to be more proactive in stepping up to help share said good practice and
contribute to setting the wider agenda.
"G-Cloud provides economies of
scale that will enable us to deliver more cost-effective ICT across local
government," Roberts concludes. "The opportunities for further efficiencies from
here and onwards are great."
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