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Digital government: waiting for a strategy

The Government promised a new digital strategy last year. We’re still waiting for publication.

The Government promised a new digital strategy last year. Then we were told it would be out by this Christmas. But with only a couple of days before the recess, we’re still waiting for publication.

In his first Autumn Statement, Chancellor Philip Hammond made fun of his predecessor’s habit of announcing funding for projects across the country, restricting himself to announcing funding for a stately home. He has also singularly failed to provide photo opportunities on building sites sporting a hi-vis jacket, breaking with another George Osborne tradition. 

But there was a more troubling absence from the Autumn Statement. In 2015, George Osborne heralded a ‘digital revolution’ in Whitehall. Philip Hammond said nothing about this. Theresa May has also stayed silent on the subject, in contrast to David Cameron’s enthusiastic support.

Our recent report shows that the revolution faces some big challenges, which is why we have called on the Prime Minister and Chancellor to throw their support behind a new strategy.

Departments need to make tough spending cuts, as well as managing Brexit. They will only be able to maintain public services if they get more efficient – and making the best use of digital technology is vital for this. Although new technology is required, the biggest challenges are about changing the way government works, which means redesigning services and the organisations that provide them. This needs leadership from the top.

We will use five tests to judge if the Government's digital strategy can address the challenges we identified. It needs to: 

  1. Set a measureable baseline: for example of how many transactional services there are, how many are digital, and how many of those are digital to a decent standard. 

  2. Identify clear priorities and trade-offs: for example whether the Government Digital Service (GDS) will continue to build applications for use across government, or will move more towards supporting departments in transforming their services.

  3. Explain how resources, including the £450m which George Osborne announced in 2015, will be allocated to these priorities.

  4. Explain how digital thinking will be brought in early in the policy making process, and how governance of digital projects will be improved.

  5. Clarify roles and responsibilities, so that the centre and departments know what they must do. This should include responsibilities for developing digital capability, where we found that government was struggling.

The Government says it will publish a new strategy before the Christmas recess. But government strategies are often aspirational rather than real – as we saw with the Single Departmental Plans.

In David Cameron’s words, “making government digital” involves “saving money and improving services at the same time". We look forward to seeing a digital strategy that will make this happen.

This blog was updated on 16 December 2016.

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