eGovernment

Rules of engagement Bridging the gap between the public and the powerful

Page 5

Online innovators

Page 11

The good, the bad, the ugly

Page 13

E-policies making their mark across the globe Failures, successes and downright disasters of public sector IT systems October 2011

BusinessTechnology

Save Our Services Will e-government sink or save our public sector?

Distributed within The Sunday Telegraph, produced and published by Lyonsdown which takes sole responsibility for the contents

an independent report from lyonsdown, distributed with the sunday telegraph

October 2011

Foreword

E-government offers the chance to tailor services and reach the public in more ways than we can imagine. A world of opportunity awaits…

By Marc Beishon

Managing Editor Lucie Carrington lucie@lyonsdown.co.uk Editor Marc Beishon Creative Director Martin Nolan studio@lyonsdown.co.uk Sub Editor Amy Dickson amy@lyonsdown.co.uk Journal Assistant Natalie Luketic natalie@lyonsdown.co.uk Project Manager Justin Payne justin@lyonsdown.co.uk For more information on any of our supplements please contact us: Telephone: 020 8349 4363 Email: info@lyonsdown.co.uk Online: www.lyonsdown.co.uk

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E-government – in this issue

Getting the message across

Publisher Bradley Scheffer brad@lyonsdown.co.uk

Business Technology

Anyone who has had dealings with the online systems of government agencies will often have had a mixed experience. While renewing a car tax disc with the DVLA can be straightforward, the HMRC site threatens to send the average small business person into a Kafkaesque world of codes and dead ends.

E-government – the part that engages directly with citizens – has suffered from far too much emphasis on what government wants from systems, instead of what people will find easy to use and engaging.

According to Jim Norton, president of the British Computer Society, the drive to “do it online” has been mostly for the government’s benefit and is aimed mainly at cost saving.

Similarly, last year’s review of the Directgov central services site by Martha Lane Fox found that a shift is needed to deliver a service culture that puts the “needs of citizens ahead of those of departments”.

Norton says that the biggest challenge in the relentless move to digital is ensuring that disadvantaged, vulnerable and older people are not left behind. “The big problem is inclusion – we need to find ways to reach people using a variety of electronic channels,” he says. They are the very people who often need services most, and ways must be found to make access easy.

E-government is more than simply engaging with the public, though – it includes relationships between public sector organisations, relationships with private businesses and as a means of engaging employees.

Some of the most high-profile initiatives have been disasters, such as the huge National Programme for IT in the NHS and the

FiReControl project for new fire and rescue control centres – one commentator queried whether these were “launched to discover all that can go wrong with a large IT-based project?” The new Major Projects Authority, set up this year by the Cabinet Office and the Treasury, may go some way to ensuring that such systems do not proceed with the huge expense and lack of scrutiny they once did.

There is a good reason why local government has been well ahead in implementing IT – local initiatives are mostly less complex than in these big national projects. For this supplement, we’ve examined many innovative case studies of local authorities, police forces, NHS bodies and other organisations using systems across the e-government tiers – mostly not involving direct citizen engagement, though. There

25p

the average cost of each electronic encounter with citizens. Information overload p5

73%

drop in graffiti in Lewisham since the council began encouraging citizens to report it via the web. Technology transfer p8

The biggest challenge in the relentless move to digital is ensuring that disadvantaged, vulnerable and older people are not left behind is, we have found, still much to do to equip employees with the tools they need to deliver better and more cost-effective services through technology.

Apart from the standard transactions we are all being encouraged to do online, there is much more data popping up online – such as local crime statistics – and pockets of real, two-way citizen engagement such as FixMyTransport and FixMyStreet. Social media, while having the potential for misuse (as in the recent riots), have tremendous potential to strengthen democracy and participation.

The possibilities are endless. And if the public sector can solve key issues, such as security and developing easy ways of delivering e-government through channels such as internet TV and in public spaces (closing libraries won’t help here), community and national life in Britain will be all the richer.

120

services sprang up to support rescue and recovery efforts following this year’s earthquake in Christchurch. Connected world p11

80%

of government spend is accounted for by the five largest IT suppliers. How are we doing? p13

Contributors Cover: Getty Images

Sponsors

Marc Beishon is a technology, science and business journalist and editor covering healthcare, IT and sales and marketing for corporate audiences and consumers. Marc has worked on IT and healthcare magazines and on New Scientist.

Michael Cross specialises in public policy, particularly where it concerns technology, healthcare and the law. He was on the launch team for The Independent and writes for The Guardian and British Medical Journal.

Sue Tabbitt is a freelance journalist who has been writing about the business impact of technology and telecoms for over 20 years, covering a range of topics for national titles including The Daily Telegraph and The Guardian.

Dan Jellinek is a journalist specialising in technology, government and democracy.

He has written for The Guardian and BBC Online and edits E-Government Bulletin.

4

Business Technology

October 2011

an independent report from lyonsdown, distributed with the sunday telegraph

Industry view

A public services network for the 21st century Plans are under way for a seamless transition into cheaper, faster delivery of public services that are more secure and better integrated

Imagine if every car in the UK had to have its own road; the cost and environmental impact would be enormous. Then picture the difference if each car shared a road with countless others. This is the scenario the government is currently facing with its ICT networks as it seeks to develop a public service network (PSN) that will replace all the different networks currently operating across the UK public sector.

This seemingly impossible task is the reason why the government is undertaking a radical shake-up of public sector ICT network procurement that will help to eliminate waste, inefficiency and barriers to creating greater collaboration and maintain security control.

The UK’s PSN is an example of what can be done when industry and government come together with an aim to save costs, improve services for citizens, increase performance and reduce procurement and administrative costs.

By replacing today’s myriad of customer networks that the public sector uses – with one multi-supplier, multi-customer network – the PSN is forecast to reduce spending by £500m from the £2.3 billion currently spent on telecommunications by the public sector.

The PSN is also a case study for what can be done in an environment where suppliers can work as a group, with customers and without prejudice.

Where we are today

The citizen may consider the public sector to be one organisation with many different faces, as befits the role that each part plays in our lives. However, the government is unable to operate as UK plc as each element is separated – with numerous networks being one of those elements that create barriers between each area. To relate to the commercial world, it would be inconceivable for a business to

operate where there were different systems separating sales, marketing, operations, finance and IT. Most large organisations would not be able to compete.

In the public sector, hundreds if not thousands of user networks connect about 5.5m public sector workers over hundreds of sites. In some instances, the networks, locations and roles overlap, so that multiple connections or multiple computers are required to access services. The PSN helps to

By 2014, it is anticipated that 80 per cent of the public sector will be connected to the PSN, creating the largest single marketplace in Europe

reduce the number of connections by being able to consolidate multiple users, multiple departments and multiple security level data and multiple applications all down to one connection.

The current situation can restrict information access and collaboration between these organisations. It also hampers the introduction of new and innovative services, such as secure cloud services and data centre consolidation. The introduction of cloud services is forecast to increase the savings government can make, from the £16 billion ICT budget, to more than £2 billion a year.

The data centre consolidation project is forecast to increase the server utilisation

from the current 9 per cent to the industry standard of 23 per cent. This should reduce the government’s data centre costs by up to half. The utilisation of PSN enables these programmes.

The Cabinet Office is working in conjunction with other public sector groups and the ICT industry, including Global Crossing, to create PSN, which will result in a more cost-effective and efficient open standard ICT network infrastructure that any certified supplier can connect to.

Essentially, it will provide a secure, private internet for all public sector organisations and create the effect of a single, secure communications network from hundreds of disconnected infrastructures across the whole of the public sector.

As a major communication solutions provider, Global Crossing is already using its extensive expertise gained from years of working within the public sector, together with its experience in the multi-supplier environment, to spearhead the first PSN implementation. The first two products, the backbone network (GCN) and network connections (PSN IP-VPN) have been awarded certification from the Cabinet Office as being PSN compliant.

This means they meet the agreed open standards for technical concurrence, the government security standards, the commercial environment created to ensure openness, fairness and encouraging new entrants – plus the service management standards that ensure service reliability in a multi-supplier environment.

The certification now means that the public sector, or suppliers to the public sector, can purchase connectivity from Global Crossing which will allow voice, IP and multimedia services at different security levels and for different users using the one connection.

Assessing the impact

The PSN standards have been published and a security model established. A services directory will be created and central government has been mandated to be migrated.

By 2014 it is anticipated that 5m users – 80 per cent of the public sector – will be connected to the PSN, creating the largest single marketplace in Europe, with PSN creating a framework for suppliers.

For years, people have called for joined-up government. By taking an inclusive, open approach that creates a level playing field for suppliers, the government will be able to take advantage of economies of scale to deliver better value and a higher standard of services to both its staff and taxpayers, plus enable those small innovative suppliers to compete fairly with the larger suppliers.

The current UK economic and financial climate means public sector organisations cannot afford to defer or avoid the move to PSN, given the many benefits that it will offer. Global Crossing is well placed to help plan for a seamless transition to PSN that delivers greater collaboration, productivity and efficiency, while maintaining the smooth and secure running of day-to-day operations.

PSN is also vital to the future of the public sector in two ways. Primarily, PSN will enable the cheaper, faster delivery of public services that are more secure, better integrated and offer greater choice.

Ultimately it will benefit the UK taxpayer by providing a framework for enabling the government technology strategy to transform information sharing, collaboration, cost savings and the use of ICT in the public sector. www.globalcrossing.com

an independent report from lyonsdown, distributed with the sunday telegraph

October 2011

Business Technology

5

E-government

Power to the people We are some way from engaging people in true participation through e-government, but the activities of some public services suggests it’s only a matter of time

By Michael Cross

Britain’s planning process is a bit of a coconut shy. One party sets up a proposal, others throw objections at it. Once in a while, a proposal gets knocked down – the would-be developer can then tweak the proposal and try again.

Although parts of the planning process have been computerised, its essence remains the same. So far, the main difference e-government has made is to save citizens a trek to the local town hall by allowing them to view applications on the web.

But what if, instead of simply digitising an existing procedure, e-government changed it entirely? What if, instead of an adversarial process, someone set up an electronic platform on which developers, residents, campaigners and experts could work together to draw up acceptable plans?

The idea appears in The Civic Long Tail, a pamphlet published last month by Demos, a leftish-leaning think-tank. Its author, Charles Leadbeater, proposes augmenting current planning procedures with a “creative process of collaboration” involving “far-flung, multidisciplinary teams”.

The possibility may sound idealistic, particularly in its optimistic view of behaviour in online forums (Leadbeater admits that the web “will not remove conflicts of interest”), but something along those lines is already being tested in another official procedure.

Peer to Patent, currently undergoing a six-month trial by the Intellectual Property Office, submits new patent applications to the “wisdom of crowds” – albeit pre-selected ones.

Virtual reality Across the European Union, 82 per cent of public services are available online and the UK ranks ninth in sophistication of online services out of 32 countries measured by the EU, in a table topped by Ireland, Malta and Austria.

Iceland is the developed country where citizens are most likely to interact with the government electronically, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, with 75 per cent of citizens using e-channels in 2010. The figure for the UK was 40 per cent, while in the US it was 25 per cent.

The cost of each encounter with citizens through different channels was: face to face: £14.65, telephone call centre £1.39, and website 25p.

Peer to Patent exposes patent claims to online scrutiny, so that non-original ideas can be discarded before they take up too much official time.

The scheme was first tried in the US, where it is claimed to have speeded up the process of scrutinising new patents by drawing on the expertise of unpaid volunteers. It’s all very Big Society – in fact, earlier this year, Chancellor George Osborne announced that he had invited Peer to Patent’s creator, Professor Beth Noveck, to advise the UK government.

Osborne told Google’s Zeitgeist conference in London that the web had the potential to transform policy-making and the running of services. “If we make the most of this opportunity, there is no doubt that we can significantly reduce the cost of government,” he said, adding that it is the government’s intention to “remain at the cutting edge of open-source policy-making”.

Noveck’s philosophy is set out in a book, Wiki Government, which has been required reading this year at the pointy-headed end of Whitehall. The basic idea is collaborative administration: “In an era when information and communications technology makes it possible for many more people to work together, we can redesign our institutions and create more diverse mechanisms for solving problems.”

The idea that e-government can radically change the relationship between public administration and those being administered is not new. A decade ago, the Labour government flirted with the concept of “intermediaries” – voluntary or commercial organisations that provide the citizen-facing end of government services. It failed to take off, partly because there was little incentive for businesses to get involved, and partly because Whitehall departments and agencies were reluctant to give third parties access to official data and processes.

Under the current government, the idea of so-called Government 2.0 seems to be coming back. A crucial first step is to change attitudes to releasing official data. Earlier this year, David Cameron promised “the most ambitious open data agenda of any government in the world” – the idea being not just to allow armchair auditors to inspect government spending, but to allow citizens, businesses and charities to create new types of public services.

There are obstacles to the plan, however.

One is financial – making government data

free deprives organisations such as Ordnance Survey of crucial revenue streams. Another objection is privacy – a study for the Cabinet Office has warned of the risks of “jigsaw identification” of individuals from anonymous official datasets. But despite these potential problems, a new “right to data” is due to come into law next year.

Meanwhile, the newly established Government Digital Service, under Mike Bracken, whose title is executive director of digital, is launching a programme to transform public services to make them digital by default.

Bracken’s team was set up following a report last year by digital entrepreneur Martha Lane Fox, originally recruited by Gordon Brown as the government’s digital champion.

In it, she called for “a service culture, putting the needs of citizens ahead of those of departments”. Bracken explains that digital by default means redesigning transactions with government from scratch, rather than reproducing paper processes in digital media.

“It’s a culture change, to think digitally first.”

An experimental website – a single site for UK government – is now up at Alpha.gov.uk, and follows Lane Fox’s recommendations. But it’s only a demo so far.

Government web services still lag behind the commercial world in taking this on board, according to Bracken. “When you apply online for a driving licence, the final frame of the process asks, ‘Do you want to apply for a driving licence?’ And you’ve just done that!” he says.

He will be concentrating on transactions where there is a very seasonal demand, such as applications for student loans, and on those with high non-completion rates. The team is also likely to be looking at third parties, such as charities and community organisations, to

design services to meet the needs of hardto-reach groups. The buzzphrase will be e-government services created “with you, for you and by you”.

Another strand of Government Digital Service work is in identity assurance. One of the stated functions of the last Labour government’s national identity register was to provide individuals with a secure log-in for online government services. The register was one of the first of Labour’s big IT schemes to be ditched following the election. The Cabinet Office plan is to replace the central register with a federated system in which citizens have a choice of ways of authenticating their identities.

To date, almost all Government 2.0 websites have involved non-sensitive data. Examples include FixMyStreet and FixMyTransport.

Such services lend themselves to guerilla activism, because they do not require government to hard-wire processes to the web 2.0 world. This is still a difficult step for government – as the launch of the e-petitions service has demonstrated.

Ministers promised that any subject attracting at least 100,000 signatures would be granted a debate in parliament. However, it did not clear it with the responsible authority, the backbench parliamentary business committee, and the first debate to be triggered by an e-petition has yet to be scheduled.

The e-petitions story is likely to be a harbinger of things to come as Whitehall and Westminster enter the web 2.0 world. Charles Leadbeater says the key to success will be in “crafting the right relationship between government as the holder and collector of data and the civic long tail of people who want to put it to public use, creatively and effectively”.

We shall see.

6

Business Technology

October 2011

an independent report from lyonsdown, distributed with the sunday telegraph

Industry view

Delivering for local authorities Local authorities can deliver their services, cut costs and improve productivity by consolidating their IT and communications and equipping their employees to work flexibly Local government faces severe financial restraints, but ICT departments are rising to the challenge of building leaner, more sustainable organisations, according to O2.

Working with senior executives in 14 local authorities, O2 has carried out a major consultation exercise called Local Government Futures Forum. The consultation aim was to find a strategy that would best help local authorities deliver their services in the face of a 30 per cent budget reduction – a challenge set by central government. O2 then commissioned leading analysts Kable to carry out research based on the consultation findings.

“The Kable report recognises that local authorities are now expected to deliver the same services for less and ICT plays a huge role in this,” says Ben Dowd, O2’s UK business director. “They want to be pushing the boundaries of technology to drive the productivity of their employees and to deliver service excellence to their citizens.”

Local authorities are finding that delivering their services using multiple ICT suppliers Dowd: understanding authorities

increases the costs and complexity. As a result they are seeking to consolidate their ICT supplier base.

“IT and communications are converging and, through our O2 unify solution, we can deliver this for our customers,” says Dowd.

“O2 is building relationships with many local authorities and we have built up a deep understanding of their needs. We can now help local authorities define their vision for optimising and transforming their current ICT assets to realise their goals in these challenging times.”

Many local authorities have already discovered the benefits of reviewing and improving their ICT services to enable their success. By equipping field-based employees to work flexibly – those carrying out home visits or services in the local community – it reduced time wasted returning to the office to update case notes. And by giving the ability for office-based employees to work from home or from other locations improve productivity and reduce fixed office space requirements.

In Harrogate, the borough council identified areas in which flexible working and adopting technology would reduce both costs and improve productivity.

They asked O2 to carry out a six-week pilot scheme in which 30 employees were

Mike Kenworthy, director of ICT at Harrogate Borough Council, says: “The pilot gave our team a clear understanding as to what’s available and suitable, and we’re already implementing some of the findings.

“We’ve signed up with O2 to provide a flexible working solution because they took an interest in our business and what we

O2 is building relationships with many local authorities and we have built up a deep understanding of their needs Kenworthy: immediate benefits

provided with a range of devices and applications. O2 really understood the customer’s needs. For example, employees visiting people in their homes could send and share real-time case information. In some cases, they were able to resolve problems outside their remit on the spot, rather than waiting until they returned to the office.

were doing. Cost is important, but it’s more important that your partners understand where you’re going.

“It added up to great customer service and importantly we are seeing immediate benefits for departments such as our arboreal team, who can now send pictures of diseased trees immediately and diagnose course of action in hours rather than days.”

E-government – or re-government?

E-government can improve services and engagement even in an age of severe austerity A crisis tends to get things really moving – and right now major governments, the UK’s included, acknowledge some degree of financial crisis. It’s no surprise, then, that those in authority are looking at new ways of working as they try to save cash.

With the help of experts such as OpenText, e-government offers the triple whammy of better service, better citizen engagement (important to politicians) and lower costs.

E-government essentially changes the way services are delivered. The concept includes technology substitution for human effort –

E-government is clearly the future, enabling fundamental service delivery change, and transforming efficiency, effectiveness and engagement the source of the bigger cost-cutting gains so far – electronically capturing, moving, sharing, securing, reporting and preserving information. This frees up public servants to focus on core value-added activities.

But service delivery changes can be transformational.

Sharing services reduces development and support costs, customer self-service options reduce the need for costly labour, and cloud services virtualise and simultaneously upgrade infrastructures.

However, if changes in worker and citizen practices look too big, adoption may be poor.

So users need information management and exploitation as a simple, joined-up experience, not a mosaic of unrelated, custom-built, custom-integrated systems, maintained by expensive consultants.

Shared services offer a compelling business case. First-mover organisations will lead their peers in development – and delivery. But supporting these changes requires a very broad set of capabilities, already integrated to bring together different information “dimensions”.

First, they need to bring together many different information types and media (including Microsoft Office documents, text, images and video), and many different channels (such as web, contact centre, paper, email and social media) must be offered.

Finally, different ways to access information and services must be available, via PCs or a plethora of mobile devices, for example.

This information must flow across, through and beyond the organisation, yet reside in a secured, unified store that is appropriately accessible and is integrated with structured information held in ERP, finance or “line of business” systems.

Catalonia: current e-interactions are more than three times 2005 levels

Has this all happened yet? No – but it is happening in parts for OpenText customers in several countries. Just one example - more than 300 services from a European capital city, through a single citizen portal, lead to a million transactions (not just hits) each quarter. That works out at 10,000 a day.

Major European government agencies are also machine-reading forms with critical data including tax or passport applications, and an American municipal authority is delivering

a 72 per cent reduction in the servicerequest processing cycle, reducing expense, enhancing service levels and increasing customer satisfaction to 99.9 per cent. In Catalonia, e-interactions of 143,000,000 are more than three times 2005 levels, services cost 50 per cent less to run and citizens’ satisfaction has increased.

The use of shared services is accelerating – strongly. Here in the UK, government agencies are collaborating on shared infrastructure, and local authorities are designing shared services around e-government enablers – “mutual outsourcing”. OpenText customers are achieving in all these areas, with a new urgency to shared services development.

E-government is clearly the future, enabling fundamental service delivery change, and transforming efficiency, effectiveness and engagement. We may think of it as simply e-government, but it could be “re-government” – a real transformation of how services are managed and delivered.

OpenText is a global enterprise software company and a leading supplier of information management solutions to governments worldwide. In the UK, over 500 public sector organisations use OpenText to achieve their transformation objectives, improve business process, and deliver services at reduced cost.

To find out more email info.uk@opentext.com www.opentext.com/uk/gov

an independent report from lyonsdown, distributed with the sunday telegraph

October 2011

Business Technology

7

Industry view

Discover the benefits of an MPS approach You can streamline services and lower costs by combining consulting, hardware, software implementation and workflow management The public sector now faces enormous challenges as budgets are cut, but pressure remains for frontline services to be maintained. Squaring this circle requires imaginative thinking and a clear understanding of the issues in hand.

Processes and procedures that have remained unexamined for many years, sometimes many decades, need to be looked at afresh with radical new approaches adopted where necessary.

The key to this approach is defining exactly what is critical for frontline service delivery.

When you consider the wider picture, the key to efficiencies in the public sector is optimising business processes – streamlined and efficient operations are vital in any public sector practice. Although the reasons are different, the methodologies remain the same whether in healthcare, education, local government or policing.

At the core of all of this is managing paperwork. How to manage the flow of information, the capture of core data and documentation, the dissemination and storage of such information, and then, of course, there’s the production of paperwork to consider.

How many public sector organisations can say they know exactly how much they are spending on print for example – not just promotional print, but also core business process printing such as reporting, invoicing, ordering, proposal generation and customer and employee-generated reporting? I doubt if many of them do.

One way of improving visibility, efficiency

and effectiveness in all of these areas is to adopt a managed print solution. Any reputable and knowledgeable provider can ensure your in-plant technologies are fully optimised to be able to not only ensure all the critical print an organisation needs to produce is produced at the most cost-effective and environmentally friendly method, but it will ensure added security is available where appropriate, giving people the flexibility to release confidential reports at a time and location of their choice.

Not only that, but a supplier like Konica Minolta, for example, will also ensure your print technology platform is fully optimised to be able to streamline business processes such as invoice and order processing.

Managed print services (MPS) is the external provision of document imaging and workflow services, which provides extensive benefits for the public sector. Based on agreed and predictable charges, management and operation of print and document production is provided by a service supplier. This provides a fully managed print solution, which requires minimum time, internal resources and oversight from the public sector organisation.

Konica Minolta bases its MPS around its unique optimised print services (OPS) methodologies. OPS is a business concept designed to manage and rationalise organisational print requirements locally, centrally or globally, and effectively in the public sector.

Part of Konica Minolta’s wider managed services portfolio, it encompasses document workflow management, BPO (business process outsourcing), ITO (information technology

outsourcing), consultancy and advice. OPS is designed to reduce costs, drive efficiencies and increase productivity in the office and within in-plant reprographic and production areas.

Konica Minolta is one of just seven suppliers authorised to supply an MPS solution as part of the buying solutions framework agreement. Buying solutions states: “Users can access innovative print solutions that can help public sector organisations reduce the environmental impact of their print activity, as well as maximising efficiency through better reprographics management.

“Both managed and extended services are available and these range from a total print management solution, where the customer outsources the delivery of its entire print strategy, to bespoke service packages for specific customer projects.”

The OPS solutions delivered by Konica Minolta combine consulting, hardware, software implementation and workflow management in order to lower costs and increase efficiencies. Based on Prince 2 methodologies, the Konica Minolta OPS programme is built on three integral areas including consultation, implementation and management phases.

It combines expert support and project management to ensure a smooth transition – ensuring that not only do organisations install an optimal printing infrastructure, but also that they transition and manage it in the most efficient way, while engaging stakeholders throughout the transition.

This results in continuous reduction in total cost of ownership – direct and indirect – and maximised efficiencies in document workflow operations.

In addition to efficiency and cost savings, a managed print service also addresses environmental conservation issues helping public sector bodies with energy saving and carbon footprint reductions, now major factors in the procurement process. Konica Minolta specifically focuses on conservation issues, conducting a ‘green audit’ as part of the process that examines paper usage, energy consumption and carbon footprint.

Any technology and service provider must have the impact of business activity on the environment at the very core of its practices, and be able to demonstrate a commitment

to environmental sustainability. As an accredited supplier on the buying solutions framework, Konica Minolta takes this very seriously, with many awards to reflect this.

As an ISO 14001-certified organisation with proactive policies that ensure best practice throughout all activities of the business lifecycle, Konica Minolta has set itself an ambitious target of reducing emissions throughout its product lifecycles by the year 2050. This effort has now been rewarded with Konica Minolta being the highest-ranked provider of image information products, coming 70th on this year’s independent Global 100 Corporate Sustainability Benchmark list.

In conclusion, a managed print service is more than just installing a new print solution.

It provides change management based on individual customer requirements. This includes dedicated project management in

A managed print service addresses environmental conservation issues, helping public sector bodies with energy saving and carbon footprint reductions accordance with recognised standards, as well as support for appropriate involvement of stakeholders and users. We see our customers as partners.

We are experts in providing business solutions and they are experts in supplying public sector services. Our relationships are built around trust and understanding, and that is why we remain one of the most recognised and experienced global market leaders in the field of high quality technology and service solutions delivery.

Jonathan Wilson is market development manager at Konica Minolta Business Solutions (UK) Ltd. For more information, call 0800 833864; email info@ konicaminolta.co.uk or visit konicaminolta.co.uk/business-solutions

8

Business Technology

October 2011

an independent report from lyonsdown, distributed with the sunday telegraph

E-government

It’s better to be connect Xxxxxxx A revamped government IT strategy has given the public sector access to the same technologies the private sector uses. We look at what’s available and how it’s being used

By Sue Tabbitt

It’s all change for IT in the public sector. Following a review of the government’s IT strategy earlier this year, the sector is being given freer access to the sort of innovative technologies private businesses have been exploiting for some time.

Previously the sector has been bound by restrictive supplier lists, precluding the easy use of smaller, more dynamic IT companies which can often provide a valuable new spin on a situation. But now the government has announced a relaxation of these rules to make it easier for the public sector to deliver more efficient, joined-up, citizen-centric services – the holy grail of e-government.

Collaborating more readily requires that public sector organisations are able to connect with each other in a standard and secure way. The government’s response has been to encourage the take-up of approved public service networks (PSNs) – optimised, high-speed country-wide communications infrastructure delivered by approved private sector service providers. Ultimately, the aim is that these all connect into a nationwide network, allowing maximum flexibility.

“Communications networks are the technology building block for all other shared services,” says Chris Gabriel, director of solutions at systems integrator Logicalis. “The next big things after that are imagination and a willingness to share.”

One of the largest networks is in Wales, where some 4,000 sites are connected – including hospitals, GPs, emergency services and educational institutions. Dyfed-Powys Police uses it to connect the force’s network of small rural police stations, while South Wales Police and Cardiff Council have built a shared call centre, allowing police and council operators to handle calls side by side.

“Now it’s a question of going deeper and wider,” says Michael Eaton, director of the Public Sector Broadband Aggregation (PSBA) network for the Welsh government, who adds that, on average, most organisations see a cost reduction of about 20 per cent over a five-year period compared with using an equivalent privatesector service.

Sharing data High-profile cases of child abuse with tragic results have focused attention on what can happen when services and the information underpinning them are not joined up. This has led to a series of initiatives designed to ensure that information will flow more freely between public sector departments and agencies in future.

Gloucestershire County Council, for example, is working towards multi-agency collaboration for children’s services by implementing two new IT systems – Integrated Children’s System and e-Enabled Common Assessment Framework from Liquidlogic. The consolidated systems will enable up to 1,600 social care and health practitioners from multiple agencies, including education, health, police and youth services, as

well as the council, to share information in an unprecedented way.

According to Paul Richards, director of children and young people’s services at IT supplier CACI, which recently completed a similar initiative for the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames, there is a lot of work still to be done. Of the 147 or so unitary authorities CACI is targeting, none so far work from a single database across children and young people’s services – although as many as 10 per cent are working towards it.

When the government first began to promote shared services (whereby multiple organisations pool resources) as the key to greater efficiencies across the public sector, its vision was largely restricted to routine back-office processes – functions such as finance and payroll. But the concept has begun to carry more weight, offering the potential for organisations to share innovative practices and replicate each other’s best ideas – without having to start from scratch each time.

As the public sector begins to standardise on open technologies and employ sophisticated computing infrastructures that allow data to be centralised, physical proximity ceases to be the determining factor in whether activities are shared, although there are advantages for certain pooling of resources. Five police forces – Avon and Somerset, Devon and Cornwall, Dorset, Gloucestershire and Wiltshire – now have one crime policing database following work with supplier Charter Systems.

In the clouds One truly transportable system is LoveCleanStreets from the London Borough of Lewisham in which a simple but effective web-based application lets council workers and the general public report instances of graffiti or fly-tipping by uploading photos to a website.

The system has proved so successful – the council has seen a 73 per cent reduction in graffiti over the past five years while the time taken to

A relaxation of these rules will make it easier for the public sector to deliver more efficient, joined-up, citizencentric services – the holy grail of e-government process a complaint has been cut by 87 per cent – that it is now being rapidly replicated across Xxxxxxxxx Britain.

LoveCleanStreets is an application hosted in a cloud-based IT environment, whereby a thirdparty runs the application and all the computer hardware, making it very easy for the supporting IT systems to be scaled up – or down – according to the demand on the service.

Each council only pays for the IT capacity they use, by way of a modest monthly service charge.

This relieves the strain on IT budgets, while enabling immediate and direct interaction with consumers. The end result is a more targeted and effective clean-up operation and a better public experience – which has been achieved quickly and at very low cost.

Another innovative service that depends on cloud computing is Transport for London’s (TfL) Tube Tracker application. This allows commuters to plan their routes beforehand via their mobile phones, using real-time service information about the London Underground.

“In a more traditional scenario, TfL would have had to design the system to cope with peak demand, but the cost would have been way beyond the available budget,” says Mark Ferrar, national technology officer for the public sector at Microsoft UK, whose technology underpins the application.

One of the aims of the Tube Tracker applications is to change public behaviour – specifically to get people off the tube at times of congestion and on to other forms of transport such as the Boris Bikes, London’s cycle hire scheme.

Ferrar says: “Because commuters can see when they would arrive by tube, they can make a sensible choice.” TfL is also testing a “countdown”

system that allows people to see when buses will arrive at bus stops.

While the public sector has to be careful with cloud-based services – it can’t afford to place sensitive content anywhere where it might be vulnerable – organisations can’t ignore the potential to roll out new applications quickly and cost-efficiently, for maximum impact at minimum cost. To overcome security concerns, some are experimenting with private or hybrid cloud environments which allow them to benefit from the cost-efficiency of spreading the IT load across groups of computer servers while retaining control over where the data is held.

On the move Last year, an international consortium led by the Brunel Business School was awarded a multimillion-pound grant to develop a mobile phone platform which will allow citizens to contribute to government policy making by inviting them to give feedback on issues that affect their daily lives.

The UbiPOL will also encourage members of the public to notify local authorities about problems in their area such as a newly formed pothole in a road. This information will then be added to a map of problem hotspots that require further attention from the local government.

Once developed, the platform will be tested in

an independent report from lyonsdown, distributed with the sunday telegraph

October 2011

Business Technology

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E-government

ted

The shape of things to come Xxxxxxxxx

both the UK and Turkey, and will initially focus on four areas – environment, urban planning, household management, and health and safety.

In the meantime, Westminster City Council is among those pioneering the use of social media to make citizens feel more included in local decisions, through informal feedback vehicles including online forums, as well as mainstream social networks such as Twitter and Facebook.

Another example of what adding a mobile dimension can do for the public sector is in Blackpool, where the council has invested in its own WiFi network to transform connectivity in the town – not only for local citizens but as a means of attracting businesses and large-scale events to the area. The latter have included large high-tech conferences as well as live TV shows, including special episodes of Strictly Come Dancing.

The Wi-Fi service enables celebrities and programme-makers to use social networking sites such as Twitter to post results and gauge reactions during and after the show. It also helps TV crews log on to their servers back at the BBC without having to plug into wired network connections.

Particularly high demand for bandwidth was reported during an international education technology conference hosted in Blackpool last

year when network traffic increased by 80 per cent as 360 or so delegates tweeted, emailed, surfed the web, and downloaded and uploaded files while moving around the event.

Joined-up security One of the biggest issues that must be ironed out if the public sector is to achieve its ambitions of a more connected service to citizens is the way security is managed across a digitally connected environment. This applies both to information between government organisations, and with members of the public as they are encouraged to complete more and more administrative processes online.

One internal approach is to use single sign-on solutions, whereby a single process of user authentication and authorisation can permit an approved user to access all appropriate IT systems without having to enter multiple passwords. This approach has been adopted by NHS Scotland across 97 hospitals and 1,300 GP practices, using a solution provided by Imprivata.

The government has been looking at a similar approach to give consumers easy yet secure access to public services online – a single log-in system that would work across all its websites, such as HMRC and DVLA. The details of the so-called Digital Identity Assurance (DIA) project are still being worked

out, as the government treads the fine line between user convenience and failsafe proof of ID. It has discounted a tie-up with Facebook, which already manages millions of users’ identities across multiple applications, but is considering partnerships with other organisations that have advanced ID verification processes, including Visa and telecoms operators.

Quick thinking Finally, the government is seeking to encourage broader use of so-called agile development methods when approaching new software projects, in recognition that one of the biggest reasons public-sector IT initiatives often fail is their unwieldy size and scope.

With traditional software projects, developers stick to a rigid plan that has been set out at the start and users don’t get to see or test the resulting system until it is finished. If this then falls short of users’ needs, all of that time and money will have been wasted.

In more agile approaches to software development users are involved throughout the project, testing functionality along the way to ensure it is fit for purpose. This also allows them to begin benefiting from the new software much earlier, as functionality is rolled out to them on an incremental basis. It looks like the Alpha.gov.uk demo (see box) is doing just this.

A new government website under trial may transform the way the public accesses information and assistance One of the most progressive organisations for citizen engagement through the internet is mySociety.org, run by registered charity UK Citizens Online Democracy.

Its sites include FixMyStreet for reporting street problems, WriteToThem, which helps people find their representatives, and WhatDoTheyKnow, for information accessed under the Freedom of Information Act. This summer it launched FixMyTransport, for communicating directly with transport operators, and it also set up the government’s e-petitions site.

Now the government itself looks to have taken on board the key message from mySociety – that of designing e-government around easy-to-use interfaces focused on the citizen – with a demonstration of what the next government site could look like.

The experimental Alpha.gov.uk is designed around common queries and problems people have in using services, such as mislaying a passport. “The team has developed what is hopefully a simple solution to this surprisingly complex problem,” the site claims, noting also that an “alpha” version wouldn’t normally be released for testing, but the aim is to get as much early feedback from real users as possible.

Will it be a replacement for Directgov?

Maybe not, but something like it surely will.

10

Business Technology

October 2011

an independent report from lyonsdown, distributed with the sunday telegraph

Industry view

Time for digital to deliver By focusing on the customer’s needs, public services will be transformed by the digital revolution Digital services can make a significant contribution to reducing the cost of delivering public services. What’s more, they are also a necessity if an organisation wants to keep up with the demands of an increasingly digital customer.

And it’s not just the customer who expects a digital future, as consultancy Atkins has recognised with its unique and highly successful approach, making a reality the vision of a digital by default modern Britain.

At a recent technology event, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne, also commented that the web was “forcing us to rethink government from the bottom up“.

He suggested that all public services can be shifted online, saying: “Officials and ministers have to justify why any aspect needs to be delivered through traditional offline channels.”

However, the benefits of digital government are not always realised by everyone. For example, some customers do not take up new digital services, choosing instead to continue to use old channels such as paper or the telephone. This can be due to poor public perception around privacy issues, difficulties of use, or a lack of understanding

of the benefits of digital services. A recent example illustrates the uncertainty. The Forum for Private Business suggested that HMRC online processes were too complex for its members to use, and an Institute of Directors survey found that only 16 per cent of respondents considered the HMRC website “easy or very easy“ to use.

Often websites are not sufficiently integrated with back-office systems, resulting in duplication of data entry which can increase the likelihood of errors, in turn

Recent government initiatives have recognised the need to drive digital government.

Key public services are now being designed as digital by default affecting the take-up. In addition, the threat of cyber attack is of great concern to both customers and service providers and can again affect take-up.

Recent government initiatives have recognised the need to drive digital government. Key public services are now being designed as digital by default, with

Steps to success: Atkins’ six-step model to achieving benefits from digital services

the only available channels being digital and assisted digital. Even in these cases, the take-up challenge remains – in the UK, more than 8m people do not currently have access to the internet.

So how can organisations encourage people to use the new digital services?

Chris Mulligan, director for Atkins’ local and devolved government business, says: “We have applied a six-step model to help

our clients drive up the volume of online transactions and deliver digital by default.

“This has delivered savings and customer benefits – the key to success is to focus on the customer’s needs.”

Contact Chris Mulligan: Christopher.Mulligan@ atkinsglobal.com or Rob Carmichael Robert.Carmichael@atkinsglobal.com www.atkinsglobal.com

Public services showing size does matter Dynamic CRM software cuts the deficit and enables more efficient public services With Chancellor George Osborne’s stated £12 billion savings in his Comprehensive Spending Review (CSR), there is greater impetus for digital interactions between residents and public services – which reduce print, paper, postage and staff costs.

You may have read about many of the projects driving digital interactions – electronic patient records, e-procurement, NHS National Programme for IT (NPfIT), for example.

Some projects are being prioritised for completion or expansion following the CSR, but many others, like the much-criticised NPfIT, are being scrapped.

“Smaller and more agile” is now the key phrase as was stated in March this year in the government’s new ICT strategy paper. It suggests: “…we will move away from very large programmes to a greater number of smaller and more agile projects.”

But which projects will succeed, cut costs and improve service delivery? Customer relationship management (CRM) software helps organisations track, know and serve their customers better. In UK public services, it is delivering great gains.

Kent Fire and Rescue Service (KFRS) is using CRM from Microsoft, customised and deployed by Optevia, to increase the number of home safety visits it performs at a significantly reduced cost.

These visits are essential and involve KFRS

CRM: rapidly and easily deployed

personnel delivering fire safety advice in the home.

The CRM has enabled KFRS to replace 36 telephone numbers with one freephone number. It enables central call handlers to book appointments directly into the diary of the home visit officers, making the process considerably more efficient.

It provides more accurate data, which enables KFRS to better understand and model fire risk, allowing more cost-effective home visit prioritisation and delivery. Plus, it helps KFRS work more closely with its other public service partners by recording a full audit trail of interactions with key groups such as vulnerable people.

The London Borough of Bromley is also using CRM from Optevia to reduce training costs of its contact centre staff and improve the quality of service given to residents via the contact centre.

The CRM acts as a single window for contact centre staff to access information held in IT systems across multiple departments.

Bromley’s staff now only need knowledge of the CRM, not five to six different backoffice systems. This reduces duplication of information and decreases call times with residents.

Telford and Wrekin Council has taken its CRM deployment from Optevia one step further by linking it with its own website.

Residents in Telford and Wrekin who already

have 24/7 access to information and services can now request services that are directed straight into the CRM, raising a job without the need for any officer involvement.

This frees up staff resources to focus on further customer service improvements and helps deliver savings through implementing more efficient processes.

Telford and Wrekin’s next development is to link service requests from the contact centre, and those raised directly by the public, to mobile devices used by staff working in the community.

This means that requests raised by residents are instantly prioritised and assigned to an appropriate officer and completed based on the officer’s workload and location.

The CRM can be rapidly and easily deployed. IT can be increased in size and shared with other departments or organisations to reduce costs further.

CRM software can help reduce costs by streamlining communication channels, helping to shift communication to the web.

Deployments of CRM across public services are great examples of the type of smaller, agile projects that epitomise the government’s new ICT strategy and can help to meet cuts identified through the Comprehensive Spending Review. www.optevia.com

an independent report from lyonsdown, distributed with the sunday telegraph

October 2011

Business Technology

11

E-government Global e-pioneers

World’s-eye view

E-government initiatives are changing the way some organisations work Brazil – e-procurement

Brazil is recognised as the birthplace of participatory budgeting (PB) – the use of both online tools and face-to-face meetings to allow citizens to directly make decisions on public spending. PB was devised partly as a way of combating corruption in areas such as Recife, where citizen-based community committees now directly oversee procurement of some public works.

The practice is gaining popularity as an engagement tool in European cities such as Hamburg and in the UK, but some of the most interesting recent developments have arrived in places such as the Dominican Republic, led by the World Bank’s ICT4Gov programme. www.participatorybudgeting.org.uk

We’re not in this alone; governments across the globe are scaling up their e-services

By Dan Jellinek

Although we Brits love to grumble about money squandered on big government IT, we are actually perceived in many countries as e-government leaders for huge, functioning projects such as our driving licence system.

That is not to say that there is not a great deal for us to learn by looking at innovation in places such as Scandinavia, with its strong social structures and history of high-tech innovation. In Sweden, for example, citizens can submit their tax returns by mobile phone, trumping our quaint, old-fashioned web service. And, as part of a new national trial led by its local government bodies, digital mapping is being used to help gather data about how public services could be improved in a more intuitive, community-led way.

The Swedish Association of Local Authorities and Regions (SALAR), with support from central government, has launched a scheme in which residents in two areas were asked – using online maps of their area – questions such as “where is it not safe to go?” or “where could a new road be built?” in a bid to help shape new policy. New trials include an exercise in which schoolchildren were asked about the routes they take to school and invited to flag up ‘scary’ places.

Project manager Anders Nordh says such tools are the key to engaging new generations with public policy. “In Sweden we have a long tradition of physical meetings, but now fewer and fewer people are engaging so we need to find new and different ways. But it takes time – you need to be consistent, have brave politicians and civil servants, and a lot of testing with different methods to see which ones can be a good complement to more traditional forms.”

Another country that has discovered the power of both digital maps and social networking to reorganise services is New Zealand, precipitated by this year’s devastating earthquake in Christchurch. More than 120 online services sprang up supporting

Estonia – ID cards

response and recovery efforts, many official but even more community-led, based both on mainstream social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter, and more specialised sites such as CrisisCommons, which coordinates volunteer efforts. Meanwhile, New Zealand message board service TradeMe set up a sub-site overnight that listed volunteer labour, emergency accommodation, and even lost and found pets.

Julian Carver, chief information officer at the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority, says: “Before the earthquake, it was very difficult for staff in local government to use social media, cloud computing and open data. To do so would have required a large

In an increasingly interconnected world, international e-government projects are also beginning to emerge, such as Capacity4dev.eu online network from the European Commission and detailed policy, and no single initiative could afford to develop that policy. After the earthquake, staff piled into the art gallery, set up temporary desks and laptops, and got the response under way.

“They used whatever worked, and had permission to experiment, make mistakes and continuously improve. They found that social media let them gauge the social mood in real time, and identify where people were frustrated, upset or confused due to lack of information. They answered questions directly, and fed information through to the media and web teams to plug the gaps.”

In a subsequent action plan drawn up by national and local government officials at an emergency meeting in July, lessons learned included that all public authorities should build relationships with local and global internet communities ahead of any crisis or disaster.

E-government innovation is not restricted to internal systems in a single government: in an increasingly interconnected world, international projects are also beginning to emerge, such as Capacity4dev.eu, an online network relaunched last month by the European Commission for both its own staff and the world development and aid community.

The platform supports development workers worldwide with collaboration tools such as online work groups. Once a user registers and declares his or her interest in various topics, relevant content is pushed out as it appears. Over the past year some 50,000 people in 210 countries have used the site, with 40 per cent of users from outside Europe.

Christoforos Korakas, project manager for Capacity4dev.eu at the European Commission, says the open facilitation and knowledgesharing model has strong potential for replication across all sorts of government agencies. “By sharing expertise on our projects, we are helping people to use the best examples from one country and apply them in another, trying to break down artificial borders between the aid delivered in one country and another,” he says.

“Through Capacity4Dev we can share expertise and best practice in different sectors.

For example, we can see where an aid delivery method works particularly well in one area such as education, then look at how it may work well on other kinds of projects.

“With this open approach we seek to broaden the discussion and share knowledge with the ultimate goal of better, sustainable development that will improve the lives of some of the world’s most disadvantaged people.”

Talk to an Estonian about the fuss made over here whenever ID cards are mentioned, and you are met with a puzzled stare. They simply can’t see the problem because since 2000, Estonian citizens have been able to legally sign official documents digitally using the same ID card that allows them to travel freely within the EU in place of a passport, vote electronically in parliamentary elections, buy virtual transport tickets, and access a host of other public and private sector services. www.id.ee

US – smartphone app

As with all things digital, many e-government trends have originated in the US, including a current shift towards mobile applications.

Miami-Dade County in Florida recently won an award from the Public Technology Institute for its 311 Direct smartphone app, which allows users to report local problems such as illegal dumping or potholes, attach a photo of the problem, and even help pinpoint its location using their smartphone’s GPS features.

Singapore – up in the cloud

The small south-east Asian nation has topped world e-government rankings from Waseda University in Japan for the third year in a row.

Its most recent e-government masterplan runs to 2015 and includes a sophisticated two-level model for government cloud computing, just as the UK government is poised to drop its own plans for a separate “g-cloud”. www.egov.gov.sg

Australia – joined-up government

Centrelink is the Australian government’s central computerised service for managing welfare services, including pensions, unemployment benefits and family allowances.

More than 40 services are available through a single online portal.

In July 2011 Centrelink became part of the Department of Human Services and will take on a range of new responsibilities, including healthcare and national disaster relief services. For people unable to use the web, all services will be available through a single telephone line. www.centrelink.gov.au

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October 2011

an independent report from lyonsdown, distributed with the sunday telegraph

Industry view

Kiosks the key to prisoner independence Self-service has infiltrated almost every facet of society, even finding its way behind the locked doors of Her Majesty’s prisons It is now not uncommon to see self-service computer kiosks installed in prisons. Prisoners use kiosks to carry out everyday tasks, such as ordering food from a pre-set menu, arranging visits, viewing notices and timetables, shopping for essentials and phone credits and managing finances.

Help yourself: giving prisoners choice

One company offering a self-service prison solution is Unilink Software, which specialises in innovative technology, including biometrics, for the criminal justice sector. It has developed solutions for the UK prison service, police, probation, immigration centres and the NHS. However, the company’s largest growth area has been in supplying prisons where their kiosks automate time-consuming and costly paper-based administration.

The company’s NForce/kiosks, first introduced in privately run prisons, are increasingly found in public sites where the benefits of self-service to help inmates manage their lives are being examined in depth. The solution consists of a robust self-service kiosk, combined with application software, designed for ease of use. Inmates identify themselves using two identification processes – fingerprint and pin code.

Prisoner data is checked and crossreferenced with a main database to validate authenticity. A series of easy-to-use options is then presented, ranging from menu ordering, shopping, finance and general applications.

Unilink partnered with UK manufacturers to create a design that is suitable for this application, with its very specific demands.

Prisons are unique environments and kiosks have to be robust to safeguard against misuse, deliberate vandalism and bullying.

Already widely used in the UK in a range of prisons, including young offenders’ institutions, the kiosks are now being introduced in New Zealand and Australia.

Prisoners report that they prefer them as they enable them to be in control of their lives due to increased self-sufficiency and empowerment. The kiosks offer a number of benefits. They help prisons save money by freeing up officers’ time, so they can focus on doing rehabilitative work.

There are also clear financial benefits of making systems more efficient and less

labour-intensive.

They result in less administration and duplication of work. They give prisoners greater independence. They reduce food wastage by ensuring that prisoners are only given what they ask for. They also help the environment, as they reduce the paper mountain created by administration.

The kiosks have received positive feedback from staff. As one prison governor said: “This is probably the most significant technological innovation in prison management that I have ever seen.” One prisoner on moving to a prison without kiosks said: “The kiosks are brilliant and save time. Why don’t you get them?”

The value of private sector collaboration Unlock the many potential benefits that leveraging private sector expertise can bring We are used to seeing our dustbins emptied by contractors, and nobody expects Whitehall departments to employ their own caterers or cleaners. But could central and local government further collaborate with the private sector to improve the quality and reduce the cost of ‘non-core’ business functions?

“With the economic downturn, government is considering what it needs to keep in-house and what could be delivered better and more cost effectively via other models – increasing private sector collaboration is one such option,” says Damien Venkatasamy, director of public sector for the UK at Tata Consultancy Services, one of the world’s top ten providers of IT and business process outsourcing services.

“The best delivery model is one where government collaborates with the private sector to deliver the best possible services.

Government can bring business-specific knowledge, skills and policy implementation experience. However, there are many areas where government could leverage private sector expertise, including administrative functions in the front, middle and back office, as well as traditional areas such as IT. The essential value proposition of engaging a private sector supplier remains unchanged, says Venkatasamy: improving service quality, whilst simultaneously reducing costs and improving quality and efficiency of operations.

“Our business model is geared to leverage our global corporate assets, including our – delivery centres, intellectual property, specialist products and over 200,000 highly skilled people – to work with our clients and transform their services.”

Tata has a history of innovative use of technology in public services – for the probation service in New York, Tata installed self-service kiosks underpinned by biometric technology, allowing low-risk offenders to self register enabling officers to devote more time to

higher-risk cases, to prevent reoffending.

Another benefit is cross-sector and global knowledge transfer. “We’ve developed best practice areas in the private sector and other countries that we could transfer to government,” says Venkatasamy. “For example, debt management for banks, where we’ve developed sophisticated analytics and

in Peterborough, and administration will be done using the company’s own core banking and pensions software (TCS B NCS), with high levels of automation and online self-service.

As government cuts bite deeper, collaboration with the private sector will move higher up the agenda, believes Venkatasamy.

Aggregation is one possible option. “A number

Government: reviewing what services could be delivered more cost effectively

business processes to improve debt recovery rates. Many areas of government are owed a lot of money in payments, fines, and benefit fraud and so on.

“We work to very high standards with our private sector clients because if our service fails, they lose money. We can bring this ethos and level of capability into the government space. Our delivery centres and staff have passed the tough accreditation processes of major financial institutions and other corporate clients, so we are able to assure government of our reliability in information assurance and security.” Tata is leveraging its private sector experience in pensions to operate the National Employment Savings Trust (NEST) – the government’s new pension scheme for low to middle income workers. All front office processing and customer service will be handled from Tata’s existing service centre

of departments or local authorities could come together to share generic back-office functions such as finance and administration,” he says. “That model could offer government some significant efficiency savings and an improvement in service quality.”

More automation and self-service is another approach. “Some labour-intensive face-to-face transactions could be done more cost-effectively using an ‘internet banking’ model,” Venkatasamy says. This is a model Tata has proven in Andhra Pradesh in India, where it developed the AP Online citizens’ portal that enables the state’s 80m people to access all government services online. “We achieved this in an environment whereby a significant proportion of the population did not have computer access, by providing kiosks via a franchise model with local businesses this ensured access for all citizens, so we know it

can be done and at scale,” states Venkatasamy.

Excellent examples of electronic services exist in the UK, for instance, millions of us renew our car tax at the DVLA’s website. But there is scope for far more, Venkatasamy believes, from applying for benefits, making payments or reporting holes in the road.

“They’re things citizens would find useful and would make lives easier, so if it can be done online, it’s a win for both government and citizen.”

Widespread redundancies have not manifested in the work Tata has undertaken with government, says Venkatasamy. “Our model is to improve services with skills, capabilities and capacity on a global scale that the government could not easily access or create cost effectively in-house. We’re into value creation, not job reduction.”

At Cardiff City Council, for example, Tata is using its global experience working with governments and its DigiGov software platform to transform the council’s backoffice functions such as a shared HR service for all the authority’s operations. This work is being done in close collaboration with the council’s in-house team and will result in better utilisation of the council’s resources. “We are now exploring what can be done to transform the citizen’s experience of council services with Cardiff,” adds Venkatasamy.

Private sector collaboration has sometimes been a bumpy ride for the public sector and there have been problems. But not all suppliers are tainted by previous failure and there are good examples that have worked well. “At Tata we have positive experiences of working with government, both in the UK and globally and we are committed long-term to this market,” says Venkatasamy. “We are confident we can bring fresh ideas and delivery certainty in implementing solutions that add value to way government delivers services – ultimately benefiting citizens.”

an independent report from lyonsdown, distributed with the sunday telegraph

October 2011

Business Technology

13

E-government

Online – but not on time?

Public sector IT has had a decidedly patchy history; so is it up to the demands of e-government?

By Michael Cross

Surrey County Council receives some 7.5m inquiries a year, on everything from potholes to libraries, healthcare to weddings. A decade ago, nearly all these inquiries would have been dealt with face-toface, or by letter. This year, 94 per cent will be handled over the web.

Electronic transactions save money – online booking of births, marriages and deaths alone will save the council £1.6m over five years – and for most people, they are more convenient. After a painfully slow start, the web is becoming the preferred channel for a range of government transactions – according to the DVLA, 54 per cent of motorists now go online to renew their car tax or declare a vehicle off the road.

E-government’s apparent alchemy – better service for less money – has caught the eye of government ministers. Hopes for keeping public services going while at the same time cutting public spending depend heavily

on making transactions digital by default.

The Department for Work and Pensions’ business plan for the new Universal Credit, for example, requires 80 per cent of claims to be made online by mid-2013. That is a bold target. Today, just 17 per cent of new claims for Jobseeker’s Allowance are online. Reaching the 80 per cent target will require a big cultural change, especially as benefits claimants come disproportionately from sections of society least able to go online.

It also supposes that the IT systems will work. The historical precedents are not good: as a parliamentary inquiry observed last month: “We have often seen problems with delivering new IT to time, budget and specification.”

This is an understatement. Over the past

British e-government: a troubled past “Could do better” is the verdict on central government’s online initiatives so far The digital by default strategy is the third concerted effort by a British government to move services online.

The first, called Government Direct, was launched in the dying months of John Major’s Conservative administration. It faltered after the 1997 election but was revived in 1999 under Tony Blair’s “modernising government” brand.

Blair set out a programme of “e-enabling” every government service by 2008, a date later brought forward to 2005 in line with a Europewide initiative.

The target was more or less achieved – by the middle of the decade there were some 3,000 websites ending in .gov.uk. The Department for Constitutional Affairs alone had 33 sites.

However, many government websites had

pitifully little traffic – a Home Office site on football violence attracted just 867 visits in 2004.

In 2006, the focus shifted to rationalisation, with the aim of reducing the number of central government websites to three: Directgov (www.direct.gov.uk) for citizens’ contacts with officialdom, Businesslink (www.businesslink. gov.uk) for businesses and NHS choices (www.nhs.uk) for NHS matters, including health advice and comparing the performance of English NHS institutions.

The current government’s plan is to turn that vision into reality, by forcing public bodies to share networks and data centres as well as websites.

The eventual aim is to create a single government domain, in which all material published by central government will share the same look and feel. “At the moment we’re like a patchwork quilt,” says Mike Bracken, head of the Government Digital Service.

20 years, well-publicised examples of public sector IT failures include the botched launch of a new passport application system, payment errors caused by the tax credits system, failed attempts to computerise the courts and the massively delayed programme to computerise hospital records and other NHS systems in England.

Of course, not every project is a disaster. Earlier this year an exhaustive investigation by the House of Commons Public Administration Select Committee reported that the public sector is probably no worse than the private sector in making large IT projects work.

However, this is no grounds for complacency: being no worse than the private sector still means that two-thirds of big IT projects run late, over budget, or both.

Government has several special headaches.

Public sector IT systems tend to be large and complex and often need to go live in a big bang to meet political deadlines. Unlike private business, which can hush fiascoes up, public sector IT failures usually get wide publicity, too. This can exacerbate problems – in the passport agency case, for example, reports of problems prompted a surge in the number of people applying for passports.

Depressingly, the committee found that government IT projects are failing for exactly the same reason as they did 20 years ago.

Typical factors include lack of IT expertise in the senior civil service and a tendency to treat IT as an afterthought.

The committee’s inquiry also noted a singular feature of British government IT schemes – a fondness for placing very large contracts with very large IT outsourcing companies. One study found that the biggest five suppliers have 80 per cent of the government market, whereas in the US, it is 40 per cent and in the Netherlands 20 per cent.

The committee said it had found evidence that reliance on large contracts hinders innovation and leaves the public sector at the mercy of a handful of suppliers. It called on the government to commission “an independent, external investigation” of what it called “serious allegations of anti-competitive behaviour and collusion”.

The government has yet to respond, but in

March this year it published a new information and communications technology strategy that anticipated many of the concerns. The strategy sets a presumption that no ICT project will cost more than £100m over its lifetime, and imposes compulsory open standards so that public bodies can reuse components of successful projects rather than repeatedly procuring from scratch.

The new approach involves so-called agile practices, building systems in a speedy and iterative way rather than specifying everything up front.

Whether the new strategy can reduce the toll of disasters remains to be seen.

Analyst Georgina O’Toole of research firm TechMarketView says there has been “slow and steady” progress – but that the real challenge still lies ahead. Persuading government bodies to share systems has been harder than expected – “There are still lots of fiefdoms,” she says.

She is also sceptical about the potential of agile development. “I don’t think it suits the government way of doing things,” she says.

“It’s all very well for relatively small projects, but when it’s a major system which is going to impact millions of citizens, that’s a different kettle of fish.”

The biggest challenge for the coalition’s e-government programme will be to reconcile the drive for rationalisation and control with that for agility and innovation.

Although the idea may be anathema to Whitehall, perhaps there are lessons to be learned from the best of Britain’s town halls.

According to the IT managers’ association, Socitm, local government is well ahead in one key measure of e-government – the ratio of successful visits to a website.

A recent study showed that 54 per cent of visits to local authority websites ended in success, compared with 28 per cent for central government. The figure for the Directgov site, run by the Cabinet Office, was 32 per cent.

Jos Creese, head of IT at Hampshire County Council and a member of the government-wide council of chief information officers, believes the key to success is being close to users.

“There is less disconnection between IT and policy-setting in local government,” he says.

“Perhaps this is because local government is less hierarchical, with politicians and top management more likely to involve IT professionals because they are more visible.

But I suspect it is also because there is less fear of IT.”

14

Business Technology

October 2011

an independent report from lyonsdown, distributed with the sunday telegraph

Industry view

The engine powering your business growth Market-leading distributor provides resellers with the widest range of products and services for the public sector Distribution – the silent partner

It is a little known fact that, in the UK, distributors handle 98 per cent of the IT and technology products purchased by the public sector. Distribution essentially brings technology to market and one of the most successful distributors supporting the public sector is market-leader Computer 2000.

Today, Computer 2000 is seen as the partner of choice when tendering for or supporting the delivery of IT solutions to key areas such as health, education, local government, central government and the criminal justice and emergency response organisations.

Enabling the market

Aligning closely with reseller channels Computer 2000, the UK arm of Tech Data Europe, provides resellers with the widest range of core IT and specialist products for the public sector.

The Tech Data collection of specialists – which include Azlan, Maverick, Brightstar and Datech – deliver the Hubbard: we are seen as an engine of growth

latest products to market to support our customers to trade effectively, whether their specialist field is IT and computing, specialist print equipment, Promethean white boards, specialised software, unified communications, networking and storage, or simply printer toner.

“Our specialist technology teams support our business partners to deliver innovative and cost-effective solutions.

For many of our partners we are seen as an engine of growth for their business,” says Peter Hubbard, sales director at Computer 2000.

Unbeatable breadth and focus

Vendors selling to the public sector, such as HP, Toshiba, Cisco, Microsoft and Promethean, position their programmes through Computer 2000. Computer 2000 is a growth engine for vendor partners because of the breadth of technical expertise, marketing support and market reach that it provides. We engage with our resellers through communications and sales activities, deliver technical training and accreditations as well as support resellers with pre-sales and marketing services.

In addition, we advance almost £1 billion each month of credit facilities to our resellers

and provide a wide range of services such as licensing-online, software asset management and pre-delivery configuration to enable them to reduce costs and meet their contractual obligations.

In today’s vast range of IT technology, integration and configuration play a large

part in most efficiency and green IT programmes.

Being able to cost-effectively combine technology solutions from the outset – with configuration and testing completed prior to delivery – can significantly reduce risk and delay.

Tech Data Corporation is one of the world’s largest distributors of technology products and serves more than 125,000 IT solution providers in more than 100 countries. Through the collection of specialist business units, we provide resellers with a unique combination of focused expertise in key areas of the market.

Computer 2000 constantly strives to enhance services. We meet the challenges of our vendors and customers by using stock and logistical capabilities, combined with our services and e-commerce tools, to offer low cost and great value while sourcing the latest technology products to support the most stringent contract terms.

an independent report from lyonsdown, distributed with the sunday telegraph

October 2011

Business Technology

15

Industry view

In search of the silver lining With public services poised to move into the cloud, critical questions about IT security and data protection must be addressed No longer in the realm of blue-sky thinking, cloud computing has developed beyond the initial hype and is now a viable and attractive option for both private and public sectors.

Many organisations are ready to consider Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Platform as a Service (PaaS) as serious strategic options.

It’s not all plain sailing, though – for many organisations, there are still concerns about the implications of adopting such a system.

Business process redesign, data security and enterprise level service management are all among those concerns.

These can be enough to dissuade decisionmakers – mainly because they have the potential to outweigh the primary benefits of cloud computing: faster deployment of services and reduced costs.

These concerns can present serious difficulties. Cloud computing projects can require major customer-led specialist input in areas such as governance, operation and service management. The resources needed are liable to be expensive, hard to find and distract from the organisation’s core business.

Equally, heavily bespoke projects may deliver specific service management and security benefits but because they are not standardsbased, also incur significant cost increases.

Both the scenarios go directly against the

grain of a public sector ICT strategy that seeks lower cost and higher value ICT outsourcing.

And the problem is compounded by a greater focus on security and integrity requirements to meet public sector needs.

So what can be done to bring cloud computing into the mainstream? The government’s G-Cloud programme will address many of the challenges by defining

A standards-based approach will help cloud projects move away from the bespoke model and allow wider adoption of cloud computing data and open technical standards, therefore helping to establish baseline requirements for suppliers and customers.

However, this is an ongoing process, extending well into 2012. In the interim, the public sector needs to consider how it can address these issues itself to ensure the security of its data while getting the

benefits of cloud computing.

According to IT services provider Eduserv, a standards-based approach will help cloud projects move away from the bespoke approach and allow wider adoption of cloud computing. The organisation – which is currently implementing a highly secure cloud platform for the government as well as one for higher and further education institutions – says public sector customers should ask their providers to improve, implement and publicise standards-based information about their cloud offerings.

Eduserv product manager Nick Loba says: “There are many security issues that organisations need to question, and cloud computing suppliers must address public sector needs. Where is our data being held, for example? What protection is there against data loss? Who can access our data and how is it isolated from others on a shared platform?”

Data residency, resilience, encryption, security, audit and tenancy are all vital matters, Loba stresses, which should be transparently handled and standards-based.

Another area that needs much more focus, he adds, is data portability – particularly for public service delivery via cloud. “Moving data between cloud providers should be totally straightforward – and providers need

There are many security issues that organisations need to address

to be ready for customers to do so, quickly and often.

“Both the industry and its consumers must understand what standards are needed to guarantee data cleansing and to ensure that any digital footprints have been securely erased once customers make the move,” he says. www.eduserv.org.uk

Entering the giants’ den Big-thinking small businesses have the chance to pitch their high-tech ideas to public sector organisations in a series of collaborative events called Innovation Den There is enormous potential in technology for enabling the public sector to deliver improved services and generate savings.

Many small businesses have innovative ideas and products which can help public sector organisations achieve these goals but the businesses are not always equipped to reach such large and complex customers.

Intellect, the UK trade association for the technology sector, provides a platform for innovative SMEs to showcase their ideas to innovation seekers in government,

local authorities and large private sector companies. Called Innovation Den, these halfday sessions were launched last year and have already enabled around 100 SMEs from across the UK to pitch their ideas to people in the public sector who control buying decisions.

These collaborative events challenge companies to prove the unique value of their proposition and offer them constructive criticism. They also enable panellists to hear exciting new ideas which they would not otherwise have

come across or considered.

“We recognised that SMEs were not always equipped to get their ideas in front of people in the public sector or the large companies they can partner with and that Intellect should take a lead in bridging this gap.

“Innovation Den has achieved this and delivered real value to everyone who has taken part,” says Sureyya Cansoy, Intellect’s director, public sector.

One chief information officer from a county council who attended one of the sessions says: “It offered me a fantastic opportunity to view

the thinking and innovation that is occurring within ICT and its SME layer.”

A director of a company who has taken part in two sessions says: “One of the biggest challenges we face as an SME is getting a foot in the door for a first conversation and my last two dens have resulted in six good introductions.”

For more information about Innovation Den go to www.intellectuk.org/cross-governmentinitiatives/innovation-den