With technology at the heart of both government and business, there is no shortage of IT issues that will affect, and be affected by, the new prime minister.
But commentators are broadly positive – widely viewing the change at the top as an opportunity, and hoping Gordon Brown’s focus on a likely General Election will help push ahead with thorny IT-enabled modernisation and address crucial economic competitiveness concerns.
Policy
The Blair government’s public service reform agenda is expected to continue, not least because much has been driven by Brown’s Treasury, including the focus on efficiency, cross-departmental working and better use of IT.
What could change, say experts, is the degree of high-level backing for IT initiatives such as the Transformational Government (TG) strategy, which focuses on exploiting technology to join up service delivery and back-office administration.
One positive sign is Sir David Varney’s review of public service transformation – commissioned by Brown and published alongside last November’s pre-Budget Report – which clearly dovetails with TG.
TG is also on the agenda of Gus O’Donnell, head of the home civil service and former top official in Brown’s Treasury.
Optimists hope that Brown’s authority as PM will give the extra impetus needed to push Whitehall along the difficult path to more joined-up, IT-enabled government.
Past efforts to join up government have floundered as departments fought to protect their fiefdoms and shied away from taking responsibility for things outside their control.
‘In terms of real transformation of the way government works, the remit around the public sector and public service reform are owned by the PM,’ said Eric Woods, government practice director at analyst Ovum.
ID cards
The majority of government IT schemes are unlikely to be affected by the change in Downing Street. But a question mark hangs over the £5.3bn plan for national biometric identity cards.
The IT supplier community expects procurement to start almost immediately. And sources within and outside Whitehall point to Varney’s endorsement of government-wide ID management as evidence of Brown’s support.
But it is a scheme that is both controversial and fraught with implementation pitfalls.
Sir James Crosby’s report on potential private sector uses of the cards is expected imminently, and will be central to the future direction.
Most insiders do not expect the scheme to be cut. But it could be put back.
‘Brown is unlikely to cancel ID cards entirely, but there is room for manoeuvre on timings and it will be vulnerable right up until the next election,’ said Woods.
Skills and the economy
As Brown’s Mansion House speech last week made clear, ‘education education education’ will be top of the agenda.
But the government must balance its natural focus on school and university-led education with the high-value professional-level skills needed by the IT sector, says Karen Price, chief executive of sector skills body e-Skills UK.
There is some ground for optimism. The Treasury-commissioned Leitch skills review says that 70 per cent of the skilled people needed in 2020 have already left full-time education. And publication of the government’s Leitch implementation plan has been delayed until Brown is in Downing Street.
‘The delay is heartening because it will now be launched by the PM rather than the chancellor,’ said Price.
‘If we are really serious about the economy, productivity and competitiveness, we have to focus on the people in work and the higher-level skills.
‘Schools and universities will not solve the productivity and competitiveness issues – there has to be a balance,’ she said.
Science and innovation
As chancellor, Brown did much to support research and development (R&D) and the UK science community.
Investment in the UK science base has shot up by 58 per cent in real terms since 1998-9. Brown’s Treasury established the R&D tax credit. And the target for 2.5 per cent of gross domestic product to be spent on R&D by 2014 is broadly supported by business.
But the government needs to take a broader view of what constitutes innovation if it is to gauge the real impact of IT on the UK’s service-dominated economy, says the Confederation of British Industry (CBI).
‘A big IT firm has an R&D figure that counts in the official statistics, but a lot of the actual value is in other firms using it to do something innovative themselves,’ said CBI head of innovation Tim Bradshaw.
There is also scope to make better use of the public sector as a customer. The government procurement budget is an estimated £150bn per year, so carries considerable commercial clout.
‘If the government wanted to invest in new technologies and create new markets then the impact on business would be fantastic and companies would really start investing in R&D and innovation,’ said Bradshaw.
‘Companies say that if a grant catalyses one unit of activity, then a contract for the same value catalyses 10 units of activity – so even a small proportion of £150bn a year could have a major effect,’ he said.
