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TECHNOLOGY & THE TRANSFORMATION
OF
FRONTLINE SERVICES
LGITU Local Government IT in Use November / December 2009
LGITU • November / December 2009
Cuts are coming - Chief executives at Solace 09 are battening down the hatches
Empowering the e-Union - LGITU reports from Malmo
eForms in Digital Britain - R e s u l t s f r o m L G I T U ’s s u r v e y p r o v e e F o r m p o t e n t i a l
P L U S : C o n n e c t i n g t h e P u b l i c S e c t o r, S o c i a l M e d i a , Vi e w f r o m We s t m i n s t e r, G r e e n News, Emergency Services, New Products & Contract Round-Up
CASE STUDIES
IT
FEATURES
IT
PRODUCTS
IT
COMMENT
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LGITU Local Government IT in Use
ISSN 1368 2660
Editor & Publisher
Helen Olsen E: Helen@infopub.co.uk T: 01273 273941
Contributing Editor
Tim Hampson E: Tim@infopub.co.uk T: 01865 790675
Special Correspondent Michael Cross E: Michael.Cross@infopub.co.uk Advertising & Circulation
Ann Campbell-Smith E: Ann@infopub.co.uk T: 01983 812623
Design & Layout
Informed Publications Ltd
Printers
DC Graphics
On the Cover
November / December 2009
Budget cuts are inevitable, say chief executives. See our Solace report on page 9. © iStockphoto.com/Marcela Barsse
In this issue... Comment Now it’s time for c-gov: government of cuts. News Update
Editorial The Editors welcome editorial information on the use of Information and Communication Technologies in local government and the transformation of frontline services. Please submit relevant material or ideas in the first instance by email to Helen Olsen: helen@infopub.co.uk
Published by: Informed Publications Ltd, PO Box 2087, Shoreham-By-Sea, West Sussex, BN43 5ZF Publisher of: LGITU, the Tomorrow’s Town Hall newsletter and www.UKauthorITy.com
© Informed Publications Ltd, 2009 All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part, storage in a retrieval system or transmission in any form, of any material in this publication is prohibited without prior written consent from the Editor. The views expressed by the Editors and writers are their own. Whilst every care is taken, the publishers cannot be responsible for any errors in articles or listings. Articles written by contributors do not necessarily express the views of their employing organisation. The Editor reserves the right to edit any submissions prior to publication.
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Empowering the e-Union Europe’s e-ministers set out their five year plan. Michael Cross reports from Malmo.
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Connecting the Public Sector Patrick Clark of Government Connect responds to LGITU’s report into GCSX.
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e-Forms in a Digital Britain Helen Olsen reviews the findings from the second stage of LGITU’s research into eForms.
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Two Parliaments of Pain Chief executives are preparing for cuts. Helen Olsen reports from Solace.
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Future Prospects Michael Cross reports from Socitm 09, where heads of IT are preparing the ‘council of the future’.
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Time to Engage Social media must engage with public sector decision makers, says Helen Olsen.
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Digital Divide Splits Parliament Tim Hampson reports from Westminster.
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Emergency Services Mobile empowering the front line; news from police, fire and rescue services.
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New Products
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Contract Round up
To advertise in LGITU call Informed Publications on: 01983 812623 Subscribe Now - see inside back cover for details
November/December 2009
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Green News ICT could reduce carbon emissions by 25%.
The Editor welcomes manuscripts and illustrations for consideration for publication, but on the understanding that Informed Publications Ltd cannot be held liable for their safe custody or return.
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Local Government IT In Use
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Now it’s time for c-gov storms that savaged the country in add a physical backdrop to TtheheNovember devastation that is Britain’s finances. Climbing out of recession, for the public sector – which must carry the burden of both savage budget cuts whilst picking up the pieces of a society in recession – will take much longer than the commercial world. Indeed, the bankers are already looking forward to Christmas and bonuses. Right now, in the public sector, the talk is all about cuts. This is no longer e-gov, or t-gov. It is c-government – the government where cuts are king. But don’t let the standards drop while you do it mind, or the wrath of the great British public, the media and your political masters will rain down on your heads. Technology must have a part to play in maintaining service standards and scope whilst operating within reduced resource. After all, is that not what technology promised? Operational efficiency, the paper-less office, more with less? Somewhere along the line there has been a breakdown in communication – indeed, if there ever was communication. Technologists have promised, leaders have bought, and rarely is either side completely happy with the result. Chief executives say that technology people ‘don’t speak my language’. And truly, there is a duty for IT to engage. But technology people - both inside and outside local government - are still not able to translate the bits and bytes, the widgets and the infrastructures, into plain English that imparts exactly ‘what’ the technology will ‘do’ for local government and, crucially, what cultural change is needed to fully deliver these benefits. It has been notable over the years that Solace draws the chief executives, Cipfa the finance directors and Socitm the heads of IT. And never the three shall mix. Surely there is now a solid case for communication across all three as to how the vision can best be technically implemented within financial constraints – not just within councils but across entire frontline public services. And how culture can be moved forward, en masse, to being performance driven but value led with enthusiastic uptake of the enabling technologies. Socitm has long urged its members to ‘take their place at the top table’. So why has this never happened? To truly help the public sector through the most challenging time of its history, technologists must engage with chief executives and finance directors to outline how, why and where technology can effect change. Helen Olsen, Editor
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NEWS UPDATE
Bonfire of bureaucracy The report suggests that government make GA is pointing its finger at central immediate savings of up to £4.5bn a year government bureaucracy for wasting Lpublic from removing unnecessary administration sector money. Simply by relieving local government from the data burdens of performance indicators and central government reporting, at least £4.5bn could be slashed from the annual public sector bill - without affecting frontline services. Nicely timed to come out just before the Pre-Budget Report 2009 on 9 December, the LGA has published, ‘Delivering more for less: maximising value in the public sector’. The report includes examples of unnecessary activity, identified by councils through their experience of working with Whitehall, which is ‘taking serious resources away from frontline resources’. “Billions of pounds of taxpayers’ money is being spent on needless bureaucracy. We need a bonfire of red tape so that taxpayers’ money can be freed up to protect frontline services,” said Margaret Eaton, LGA chair. “We need to make sure there is no unnecessary bureaucracy and that the vast array of different bodies providing public services do not waste money by duplicating the work others already carry out.” Eaton said that the recession is forcing “everybody who spends taxpayers’ money to think about how they can do more with less… Staying the same is not an option.”
and red tape before implementing cuts affecting local services: • £400m from removing the current performance and reporting data burden; • £250m from halving costs of regulating local government from the centre, abolishing government offices and reallocating improvement funding to local government; • £1.5bn from reducing departmental administration costs of seven departments with close links to local authorities by 20%; • £1bn saving on departmental resource budgets through reducing unnecessary policy activity; • £900m savings from giving councils greater spending flexibility; • £430m from unnecessary spending by quangos on administration. Over the last ten years the number of full time employees working in central government has increased by 21%. Communities and Local Government (CLG) has reported a 10% increase in permanent staff in financial year 2008/9. Quangos have also significantly increased their expenditure – by £24bn to £43bn in 2008. www.lga.gov.uk
OS data to be set free rom as early as next April the public may have access to Ordnance Survey (OS) data about electoral and local authority boundaries, postcode areas and mid scale mapping for use in digital innovation and to support democratic accountability.
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Making public data available also enables people to reuse it both commercially and in social initatives - apart from generating an estimated billion pounds for the economy the move would open up new tools for citizen engagement and public information.
Prime minister, Gordon Brown, made the announcement in response to “the demands for better use and access to data held by government. In this new world, smarter government is not an option but a necessity.”
The move is seen as a victory for the Guardian’s three-year Free Our Data campaign to persuade the government to “abandon copyright on essential national data, making it freely available to anyone, while keeping the crucial task of collecting that data in the hands of taxpayer-funded agencies”.
Communities secretary, John Denham, added, “Any public service reforms must be open about what is going on so that those outside it can examine what is happening and to propose alternative ways of doing things if necessary... This can only happen if the necessary information and data about what is currently delivered is easily and readily available.” Minister for Digital Britain, Stephen Timms, who has responsibility for the ‘Making Public Data Public’ initiative, said that the announcement was “an important step in our public data strategy. About 80 percent of public sector data mentions a place. Making Ordnance Survey data more freely available will encourage more effective exploitation of public data by businesses, individuals and community organisations.” Local Government IT In Use
utting people on the map: Sir Stirling Moss and Alan Hinkes helped Ordnance Survey launch Locatorz, a new mobile phonebased locating service that allows you to view a person’s position to within 10 metres. It uses a mobile phone’s GSM connection to transmit its position to the Locatorz server, which plots the information on an OS map and sends it to a secure internet page.
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www.ordnancesurvey.co.uk November/December 2009
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NEWS UPDATE
WiFi first for Swindon residents windon will be the first town to give all 186,000 residents free internet access when its £1m WiFi ‘mesh’ goes live next month.
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The mesh can also potentially provide free internet telephone calls, opening up new telehealth and telemedicine possibilities for the council.
Digital City UK, a partnership between the council and two private companies, will give every resident free standard wireless access to the internet. Investment in the 1,400 secure access point ‘Signal’ will be recouped by offering upgrades for faster access offering higher download speeds.
Rod Bluh, Swindon Borough Council leader, said: ‘’This is a truly groundbreaking partnership which will have real benefits for everyone living in Swindon.
The project was launched today as a partnership between the borough council and two private companies which will recoup their investment by offering upgrades and faster access at a yet to be determined price. However, every Swindon resident will receive free wireless access to all but the highest bandwidth internet sites. Anti-virus software, and popular services offered by Microsoft and Google will be available on the network. Plans include potential delivery of remote CCTV services and real-time information on home electricity usage and air quality monitoring.
‘’Not only will residents in the borough be able to access the internet for free; the council and its partners will be able to use the technology to provide cutting edge services to the areas or individuals who need them. ‘’Digital City will also provide the council with a unique funding stream and it is our intention to use our expertise to help other local authorities follow our lead.’’ Rikki Hunt of project partner, Avidity, said: ‘’This is a fantastic opportunity for the whole of Swindon creating total social inclusion through our free service and, while others talk, Swindon is delivering a Digital City which will benefit both the public and business communities.’’
ICT could reduce carbon emissions by 25%
ixteen English councils are set to S reduce their energy bills by nearly £1m per year and cut their annual carbon
technologies have the potential IG20CT-based to reduce carbon emissions by 25% in the countries, compared with 2006
emissions by nearly 4,700 tonnes after receiving the green light for their energy efficiency projects. The councils have been awarded nearly £4m in interest-free loans from the £51.5m Carbon Trust fund.
baseline emissions, says IDC. The analyst has been focusing on where ICT can bring ‘immediate benefit in reducing carbon emissions’. It believes that significant reductions can be made across all the sectors it surveyed: energy generation and distribution, buildings, transport, and industry. Technologies highlighted include integrating renewable energy into energy distribution using smart grids, ICT-enabled smart building systems, ICT-optimised supply chains, and variable motor controls in industrial machinery. IDC’s study focused only on technologies that are ‘currently mature enough to be implemented within three years (given investment and government approval); have significant network and processing bandwidth requirements; and are standalone technologies, applicable to specific industries and usage patterns.’ www.idc.com/events/climate
rawley Borough Council is reporting C substantial savings - averaging 11% on annual mileage per vehicle - across its Amenity Services Fleet thanks to live tracking and logging of vehicle movements over the internet via Masternaut Three X.
Videoconference to cut CO2 mey has cut 40,000 kilos of carbon A emissions and saved £180,000 in its first year using Tandberg videoconferencing systems. VMeetings now enable staff to schedule virtual meetings and register attendees through its intranet. “Lots of people were driving long distances for fairly short, routine meetings,” said Keith Sexton, Amey’s director of health, safety, environment and quality.
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November/December 2009
he government is forging ahead with the TEnglish introduction of ContactPoint to every local authority, saying that recent trials were an “outstanding success”. Supporters of the long-delayed £224m project say it will make England’s 11 million young people safer by providing a single register that can be used by all child protection professionals. An evaluation report of the initial phase of the ContactPoint roll out, ‘Lessons Learned from the Early Adopter Phase’, states that early feedback from practitioners is good, with over 75% believing ContactPoint will be helpful in their future work. In one area a deputy principal has already been able to locate eight students missing from education for over a year using ContactPoint. However the future of the project remains in doubt as both the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats have vowed to abandon it. ContactPoint was developed in response to a key recommendation of the Laming Inquiry into the death of Victoria Climbié and has been designed to help frontline practitioners work across organisations, arming authorised professionals with a quick and easy tool to find out who else is working with the same child as early and as quickly as possible.
rivatise to survive: Councils are advised to prioritise spending and outsource P more services. Councils, rather than Whitehall, should commission new partnerships that focus on mutual interests and pre-determined meaningful outcomes which can be achieved ‘using fluid budgets’, argue think tank, Localis, and KPMG. A new report, ‘The Bottom Line – a vision for local government’, states that such a move would allow services to be ‘more personalised around the requirements of the end user’. Councils are advised to reassess their priorities against cost and innovate. ‘If they are to achieve much needed expenditure reductions of around 20% by 2011’ they will need to ‘look long and hard at the services they provide and find new ways of managing them if they are to cut costs’. www.localis.org.uk irmingham chief hits out at barriers to total place: Radical reforms in public B funding and governance will be necessary to make the ‘total place’ concept of integrated services a reality, says Jason Lowther, director of policy and delivery at Birmingham City Council. The city has identified seven barriers to organising services around individual citizens rather than organisations. Top of the list was “short term financial horizons” making it impossible to create a business case for early interventions. “We need to talk to Treasury about paybacks over a ten to fifteen year period,” Lowther said.
wenty million pounds is to be invested in innovative energy efficiency measures to cut emissions and energy bills in central government departments. The allocation is part of the package of £405m low carbon funding announced at the Budget in April to help establish the UK as a market leader in renewable technology and advance green manufacturing.
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ContactPoint rolls out
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NEWS UPDATE
top thief: Police forces from South Yorkshire and Nottinghamshire took just 30 minutes to intercept and recover a stolen Nottinghamshire County Council pick-up truck. The vehicle had recently been equipped with a Thatcham Category 5 satellite tracking device from Masternaut Three X.
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Scotland takes the high road to online health s political flak continues to fly over the A £13bn programme for IT in the English NHS, eyes are turning to its Scottish counterpart to see what can be done. The NHS north of the border has given GPs, health help-line advisers and accident and emergency doctors electronic access to the summary records of nearly all patients. The service is also about to sign a national contract to modernise hospital software. Nearly all practices in Scotland are now connected to the Emergency Care Summary (ECS), a basic set of read-only data including drug prescriptions. Dr Libby Morris, chair of the Emergency Care Summary Board, NHS Scotland, told the E-Health Insider Live conference in Birmingham that the programme had provoked little dissent. The system holds 5.4 million patient records (including those of deceased patients, which are held for two years). Only 1,400 patients, or 0.02%, have opted out. This is in marked contrast to England, where the equivalent Summary Care Record (SCR) is running years behind schedule because of doctors’ worries over patient confidentiality and consent. Dr Morris said the record had already helped saved lives. In one case, a 62-yearold woman admitted in an emergency went into a coma and a pharmacist who checked the ECS found she should have been receiving insulin. The key to success was gaining doctors support, and providing systems that audit unauthorised accesses. omad home: The original e-government project to provide mobile and flexible working for local authorities, due to close in November through lack of funding, has been given two new leases of life. Project Nomad is to split into two: Nomad North and Nomad Scotland, with Ken Eastwood of Barnsley MBC and Nomad Scotland chair, Aberdeenshire’s Mark Baker, to take over the initiative. www.projectnomad.org.uk
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Smith minister for e-government
Local partnerships will end power of big IT vendors
t has taken some time since the reshuffle in July, but the government has finally named the minister responsible for e-government and information security and it is Angela Smith.
dam Afriyie, shadow minister for science and innovation, says that a future A Conservative government would reduce the
The Basildon and East Thurrock MP is also minister for the Office of the Third Sector and her work includes working with voluntary and community groups, social enterprises, charities, cooperatives and mutuals. The Cabinet Office has confirmed that to her portfolio has been added responsibility for the Office of Government Chief Information Officer and information security and assurance.
The Tories are considering the use of multiple proof-of-concept pilot projects: “If several suppliers are asked to come up with working solutions, they can then be piloted, and the most successful can be scaled up and rolled out nationally.”
Other responsibilities ratified are that work and pensions minister, Jim Knight, will take on finding ways to include the four million people digitally excluded. He will also take on the role of webczar for the government’s one click site, Directgov. As departmental IT and data security minister, he will sip from the poisoned chalice of being held responsible for senior politicians and civil servants who lose laptops and memory sticks with sensitive information on them in the backs of cabs...
He added, “By using standard data formats, like XML, government can open up the procurement process to the widest possible base of suppliers. With inter-operability, large projects can be split into manageable, modular chunks... The outcome is a more flexible procurement process where it is easier to change suppliers and resolve problems as they emerge.”
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At the Department for Children, Schools and Families, schools minister Diana Johnson’s responsibilities include ICT and the digital curriculum. And ContactPoint has been given to Baroness Morgan in the House of Lords. CO gets teeth: The cost of storing and managing electronic data could rise as the government consults on £500,000 penalties for serious breaches of data protection principles. ‘Civil Monetary Penalties: Setting the maximum penalty’, seeks views on government plans to fine organisations which mismanage data or fail to comply with the Data Protection Principles set out in the Data Protection Act 1998. Justice minister, Michael Wills, said, “We want to ensure that the Information Commissioner’s Office has the powers it needs and is able to impose robust penalties on those who commit serious breaches of data protection principles.”Consultation closes on 21 December 2009: www.justice.gov.uk
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power of a small number of large IT suppliers.
This would, he said, “reduce reliance on a handful of big vendors and increase the proportion of IT budgets spent with innovative young companies.”
ansley pledges telecare advances: “NHS investment in telecare benefits local Lauthorities by reducing their domiciliary care costs,” said shadow minister, Andrew Lansley. “So we will require PCTs to promote joint working with local authorities. That means budget pooling and joint commissioning.” Lansley said that telecare, mobile technology which identifies risk and monitors patients electronically, has been shown to work - a project in north west Surrey reduced the number of people entering residential care by 11% in a year. ecession begins to bite local authorities: Many local authorities are sitting on a R financial time bomb as the true cost of recession - in terms of job losses, bad debt, fraud and the consequent demand on public services – has yet to impact on public finances, according to Experian’s Quarterly Insight report. The full costs will occur several months after unemployment peaks and continue after economic growth resumes. Authorities in the north east will among the be hardest hit. London boroughs such as the City of London, Westminster and Kensington and Chelsea will see relatively less impact.
Britain Works Microsoft is offering £18m worth of training vouchers for the community in its Britain Works Challenge. The software giant has put its money where its mouth is by backing up its ‘Britain Works’ campaign with a competition offering £18m of training and exam vouchers for the best local authority programmes addressing unemployment and digital skills in the community. Three councils will share the prize; however, all entrants will receive complementary IT Academy membership to support local activity. Closing date 18 December: www.microsoft.com/uk/challenge Local Government IT In Use
November/December 2009
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E-UNION
Empowering the e-Union Europe’s e-government ministers have set out their next five-year plan for e-government. Michael Cross reports from Malmo. nglish local government provided two of the three UK finalists at this year’s European e-government awards, announced at a ministerial meeting in Malmo, Sweden, in November. The projects were Kent TV, the web TV channel led by Kent County Council, and Liverpool Direct, the joint venture multi-channel service organisation set up by Liverpool City Council. (The third was the Scottish Executive’s e-procurement project.)
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Both English projects chimed very much with the emphasis on empowerment set by the next e-Europe action plan. However they were beaten to the prize by the Danish municipality of Gentofte, which has developed a one-stop shop to online services provided by national and regional agencies as well as private organisations. That is a vision of future e-government likely to be emphasised heavily in the next European e-government action plan, which will be drawn up by the European Commission to implement the philosophies of a ministerial declaration signed at the Malmo meeting. Unveiling the declaration, Sweden’s e-government minister Mats Odell (his formal title is minister for local government and financial markets at the Finance Ministry) stressed that a central aim of the plan is to underpin the mobility of individuals and businesses across the EU. “The aim is to make it as easy to study in London, retire in Italy and work in Sweden as it would be to do all three in one country,” he said.
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ministers (and the tabloid press) will stomach. Hence the i2010 action plan’s emphasis on digital inclusion – it was inserted at the 2005 Manchester ministerial summit by a UK Cabinet Office desperate to deflect attention from ideas about panEuropean identity cards. However an official evaluation of the i2010 action plan, released without fanfare at Malmo, concedes that the approach to digital inclusion was flawed. The plan was that member states would identify flagship e-government initiatives and exchange information on them. In reality, “The identified flagships have been somewhat disappointing, probably because of the uncertain quality of many of them, who selected them, why and how, even though they have had some awareness raising value. This approach should not be the priority for the future.” Significantly, digital inclusion makes only a fleeting appearance in the Malmo declaration. The pledge is that: “We will develop inclusive services that will help to bring down barriers experienced by digitally or socially excluded groups.” However there is no indication of how such barriers might be tackled, or targets for doing so. The Malmo declaration is deliberately pitched at a higher level than its predecessors, eschewing targets in favour of general directions of travel. The declaration sets out four ‘policy priorities’ for 2010-15. These are:
However, no matter how desirable that lifestyle, the vision may be difficult to sell in the highly Euro-sceptic atmosphere of UK politics. Significantly, the UK’s representative at the meeting, Cabinet Office minister, Angela Smith, stressed the extent to which the declaration “reflects” British ideas.
• Empowering citizens through services designed around users’ needs and developed with third parties. This aspiration includes access to public information and freedom to re-use it, more transparency and ‘effective means for involvement of stakeholders in the policy process’.
Up to a point, this is true: the ‘power of information’ idea of encouraging the re-use of public sector information is very much a UK idea. But, although ministers are loath to admit it, Britain’s e-government programme has tended to follow, rather than lead, the EU’s ‘information society’ agenda. Ever since the e-Europe plan of 2000 – which first set the 2005 target for e-enabling public services – UK officials have been fighting guerrilla actions to ensure that pan European e-government plans are based on ideas that their
• Mobility enabled by ‘seamless e-government services’ for setting up a business and living, working and retiring anywhere in the EU. The stated target is to create ‘noticeable and positive change’ in the ease with which a business can be set up and run, and ‘noticeable and positive change’ in the ease of moving to another member state to study, work and retire.
November/December 2009
• More efficient and effective administration, reducing administrative burdens and carbon emissions. Local Government IT In Use
Cabinet Office minister, Angela Smith (right), with Liverpool Direct in Malmo.
• Underpinning these priorities by putting in place ‘appropriate key enablers’ and ‘legal and technical preconditions’. These include electronic identities and electronic signatures as well as a ‘joint infrastructure’ based on interoperability. Here there is strong support for the adoption of ‘open specifications’ but less for open source, which the declaration merely suggests ‘could be promoted for use in e-government projects’. Technically, it is only a statement of intent and an invitation for the European Commission to create a new action plan. However officials are already at work turning these pledges in to specific points for action. Will anyone take any notice? Up to now, the record of pan-European e-government has been patchy. The i2010 progress report reveals plenty of ‘challenges’. Specific targets for e-enabling ‘high impact’ services are likely to be missed, the evaluation says. Particularly embarrassingly, the low-hanging fruit of public e-procurement remains out of reach. Despite ‘considerable progress... it is not likely that all countries will have reached the 100% online availability and 50% usage targets by 2010,’ the report states. As for identifying Pan-European high impact services, only ‘a minority of countries’ have bothered; most national and regional administrations have other priorities. On the 2010 plan’s proposals for efficiency and effectiveness, the report finds that evidence for actual achievements is ‘mostly anecdotal’ - for example the Austrian government’s 38% savings from digital archiving. The review recommends that the next plan should concentrate on the demand side of the e-government equation. This will involve ‘more open, engaging and porous forms of governance which permit a plurality of stakeholders, intermediaries and channels in the service value chain’. Such ideas figure strongly in the Malmo declaration, which promises to ‘strengthen transparency of administrative processes’ and ‘involve stakeholders in public policy processes’. Such sentiments are easy to insert in a ministerial declaration but difficult to translate into specific measures, let alone those with measurable outcomes. The 2015 action plan, when it appears, should make interesting reading for all, not just for e-government wonks.
GCSX
Connecting the Public Sector Patrick Clark, head of programme management at Government Connect, DWP, responds to LGITU’s report, ‘Connecting the Public Sector’. n a remarkable example of successful joint working, local authorities, the DWP, DCSF, DCLG, the LGA and SOCITM, have implemented the Government Connect Secure Extranet (GCSX).
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As LGITU goes to print all local authorities needing access to DWP systems are connected to a secure, pan-public sector communications infrastructure, offering a new platform on which to build joined up, effective and efficient public services. Local authorities are now ideally positioned to take advantage of GCSX and use it in new ways that are beneficial and helpful to them and the citizens they serve. However, whilst the technical foundations for secure and cost effective communication and joint working are now laid, the cultural perception of the importance of data, and the consequences of unauthorised use or access, lags significantly behind. As can be seen in this report, senior officers are well versed in the need to follow appropriate Data Handling Guidelines, yet practice – and training - on the front line is not consistent. Councils must work now to deliver the cultural change necessary to ensure the physical safety of sensitive information. Clear identification of data ‘assets’ and ownership is needed, along with consistent training on the duties of data handling and procedures in case of breach. That 63.8% of survey respondents did not know whether their organisation had such policies and training programmes suggests there is much work yet to do on this front. GCSX, by dint of requiring proven and trusted security protocols, supports frontline implementation of the Data Handling Guidelines. As a ‘first choice’ conduit, secure electronic transmission avoids the danger of frontline decisions taken in haste - or for reasons of expediency - that put sensitive citizen data at risk. Indeed, it is encouraging to see that the programme rolling out GCSX was credited in many cases with raising awareness of such issues. From Place Shaping to Total Place, customer insight to preventative services, the ability to securely share information and open trusted channels for joint working has obvious benefits. With the ‘perfect storm’ brewing, where spiralling demand for public services and support in a recessionary Britain meets
dramatic decreases in available resource, now is the time for frontline organisations to look carefully at driving maximum benefit from their current infrastructures. As can be seen from the Benefits Realisation Fund projects (right) GCSX represents a major opportunity to make fundamental step changes in delivering improved, cost effective services. With GCSX in place the barriers to joint working are no longer financial or technical. Pioneering work joining up officers in different organisations to improve services is under way in these pilots - exploring the benefits in, for example, trading standards, joint asset recovery, tackling crime and antisocial behaviour, business crime, place shaping, civil contingencies and safeguarding children. Indeed, GCSX couldn’t come at a better time. Following recent industrial action public and business’ confidence in the postal service has been severely damaged. In this brave new electronic world the citizen expects secure, efficient joined up public services - accessible to them in the way that they choose, but powered seamlessly behind the scenes by proven and secure technology. I believe that GCSX provides the secure communications required to support the delivery of truly joined up, citizen-centric, front line services across the public sector. CSX, Central and Local Government: Developing opportunities for joint working and secure information sharing between central and local government:
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• DWP and councils - housing and council tax benefit, In and Out of Work and Tell Us Once. • Youth Justice Board, HM Courts Service and local authority Youth Offending Teams.
To download the full report or an executive summary visit: www.ukauthority.com/connecting
I&DeA GCSX Benefits Realisation Projects Bristol City Council: Trading Standards and intelligence sharing in the South West (SWERCOTS) Conwy County Borough Council: Joint Asset Recovery Database (JARD) Dartford Borough Council - Kent Connects: Kudos, tackling crime and antisocial behaviour Devon County Council on behalf of the Devon ePartnership: Flexible Working Dudley Metropolitan Borough Council: Business Crime Partnership Great Manchester Public Protection Partnership (GMPP): Business Compliance - Regulatory Services Halton Borough Council: ‘Place shaping’ through GIS data sharing Hampshire County Council on behalf of the Hampshire and Isle of Wight Partnership: Exploring a regional approach to employee authentication Lancashire Council (Lancashire Constabulary & Police): Antisocial behaviour data sharing in Lancashire Lichfield District Council: Business data sharing in the West Midlands London Borough of Islington: No Recourse to Public Funds London Trading Standards Authority (LOTSA): Trading Standards and Regional Intelligence in London North Kesteven District Council on behalf of the Lincolnshire Public Sector Working Group: Customer Data Hub
• Trading Standards, the Serious Organised Crime Agency and JARD.
Plymouth City Council on behalf of Devon ePartnership and Isles of Scilly: Civil Contingencies/Emergency Planning
• Police, fire & rescue services and councils tackle crime, improving community safety.
Rochdale Metropolitan Borough Council: Blue Badge Scheme
• Patient identifiable data with NHSmail users (PCTs, acute trusts, GPs etc) and councils.
South Lakeland District Council: Information sharing to facilitate a needs led approach to older people
• Contact Point, the Common Assessment Framework (eCAF) and Free School Meals (FSM) plus secure email partners such as the Family Courts.
Sunderland City Council: Births - Tell Us Once
• A secure communication platform for shared emergency planning and response. www.govconnect.gov.uk Local Government IT In Use
Torbay Council on behalf of Devon ePartnership: Safeguarding Children - GC Mail
www.idea.gov.uk November/December 2009
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INTELLIGENT FORMS
eForms in a Digital Britain – Intelligent forms and efficient service delivery Can the latest generation of intelligent forms help transform public services? Helen Olsen reviews the findings of LGITU magazine’s survey into this often misjudged technology and looks at its potential to unlock savings in public service delivery.
he most important finding the research team took away from the initial qualitative exercise (reported LGITU Sep/Oct 09) was that many people believe that eForms were “done” under the local e-government and wider e-government programmes of the early part of this decade.
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However, in the landscape of the Digital Switchover of Public Services Programme in 2012, the latest generation of eForms technologies look like useful tools for this process of delivering digital-only channels. Bob Kamall, senior policy advisor, public service reform, at the Cabinet Office says that eForms “could indeed play a key part in delivering on the Digital Britain promise to switch to digital channels from 2012”. He is keen to point out that the switchover programme is still in its early days and that the current economic conditions “will impact on any plans that departments may have for eForms, whether new or existing initiatives“. Indeed, cost savings in the face of inevitable cuts – whichever political hue they are dictated by – will be fundamental to public service delivery for the foreseeable future and will inevitably influence the direction of developments. Solutions that remove layers of complexity and process – and therefore cost – will undoubtedly find favour. Projects that the Cabinet Office is looking for to ‘trail-blaze’ the digital switchover must be easily replicable by other parts of government, and must demonstrate their contribution to streamlining of processes and efficiency. They must also, inevitably, deliver significant savings on current means of service delivery. The future of public sector services leaves no room for ‘add-on luxuries’ – the future is efficient, streamlined and cost effective. Less, rather than more. It is in the context of digital switchover that the key message coming back from this project’s initial interviews was surprising: eForms were “done” in the e-gov programme. Indeed, it became evident that many views on the technology are stuck in that era. However, 7
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those using the latest technology were keen to highlight just how far the technology and its capabilities had moved on since then.
Leaving out the belief that eForms can cut processing costs, other benefits identified in the quick survey were:
A subsequent ‘quick survey’ elicited 200 responses from across frontline and central government services, from which two findings leap out:
95%
96%b
elieve that eForms can cut the cost of processing customer transactions
58%
believe that eForms can be easily integrated with existing back office systems
It is interesting to see that so many believe that eForms can deliver savings; even when so few believe that back end integration is easy. Indeed, many of the comments revolved around this issue, suggesting that the real benefits of eForms “would only be realised when back end systems were integrated” – indeed, the benefits were being “underestimated”. These results suggest that if back end systems and process workflow integration was achievable there could be a dramatic step change in service delivery and cost. This belief about the difficulties of backend integration mirrored the in-depth sample – where the issue scored an average of 2.9, but had the widest range of answers of all questions. Some strongly agreed and others strongly disagreed with the statement.
think that eForms could reduce error rates by removing the need to re-key information and by being able to validate information as it is entered on to a form say that eForms can speed up the process of service application/delivery
91%
believe that eForms can pull together/send information to multiple back-end systems from one form
84%
feel that intelligent eForms were highly accessible and easy for the citizen or business to use
74%
feel that eForms offered a high quality customer experience for the citizen or business
74%
believe that eForms can standardise delivery of their organisation’s services via third party/agencies
72%
think that eForms could enable secure joint working for their organisation with other parts of the public sector
71%
Benefits Many respondents in the quick survey reported successful developments. Said one “It has been one success story in my organisation being rated as one of the best 30 local authority websites for customer experience in the UK.” Explained another, “We use eForms quite a lot now and have integrated with our other e-channels to present one customer portal to our citizens. One reported that, “Increasingly we are moving over to their use in delivering frontline services to the public.” Local Government IT In Use
think that eForms could enable the secure sharing of information where appropriate
71%
Use, cost and development In the in-depth survey, most used both paper and electronic forms. Said one: “We can use paper, but we prefer electronic forms. We have made it easy for service providers to use the electronic forms.”
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INTELLIGENT FORMS The sample was not large enough to state statistics. However, of those who knew how many electronic or paper forms were used in their organisation (approximately half) the numbers ranged from less than 10 to over 100 for both types of form.
existing eForms compliant with AAA accessibility standards.
Interestingly, not one respondent knew what the cost of processing either electronic or paper forms was to their organisation. And only two respondents were able to estimate the cost of developing either electronic (range £0 to £10,000) or paper (£0 to £25,000).
Just four of the central government organisations (33%) in the in-depth sample had the ability to develop eForms in-house. The others did not know whether their organisation had this capability or would “Look to the private sector for help”.
This finding was backed up in the quick survey: did not know the cost of developing an eForm
In contrast, almost three quarters (74%) of the quick survey among central and local government and other frontline service organisations said that they had the ability to develop eForms in house.
did not know the cost of developing a paper form
Barriers to eForm development
83% 88%
Interestingly the expectation in the indepth exercise was that paper forms were more expensive to develop. In the quick survey this was reversed, with those putting a figure to the estimate for development assuming that paper forms were cheaper in general to develop than electronic forms. Of note too in the quick survey was that many of those commenting about the cost of eForm development were clearly factoring in the overall integration and business process re-engineering. Plans for future development were hazy, with varied estimates of expected form development – ranging from ‘less than 10’ to ‘over 350’ on either electronic or paper forms. However, one central government respondent said that their organisation had no plans to develop further paper forms, but intended to develop 80 electronic forms. Accessibility was seen as important, with requirements for new form developments and plans to make
In-house development capabilities
The impression that eForms ‘had been done’ under e-government may hurt future developments – the fact that these initial implementations had not delivered ‘end to end service transformation’ or integration into back-office systems may be perceived as a limitation with the technology of today, rather than the technology available in the e-gov era. The parlous state of the economy and the public sector purse will also inevitably impact development. However, this may well be mitigated with solid metrics looking at the latest achievements in eForm projects. Problems with past back-office integration techniques and workflow in both the in-depth and quick survey samples had left an impression that this was a limitation of the technology. Security of forms has also been seen as a major barrier in the past – but this may change with advent of the government secure extranet, GCSX, and the latest
eForm technology security capabilities. However, culture change, legalities of digital signatures and the ability of applicants to satisfactorily identify themselves are seen as barriers of today’s technology. Referring to culture, said one respondent, “Authorities are used to working in a certain way in the paper world and want to translate it wholesale into the electronic world.” Another added that “the public sector tendency to try to cover every conceivable eventuality in online services delivery” would be a major barrier: “This leads to public sector screens often being complicated with guidance... with notes regarding exceptions/exclusions.”
Positive outlook In the quick survey these themes were repeated. However, repeated referrals to the “complexity” of processes that eForms needed to accommodate were tempered by acknowledgement of the opportunities their implementation present for re-engineering business processes. Key themes to the comments in the quick survey emphasised the importance of end to end integration if benefits were to be delivered. The enthusiasm of those that had encountered early success was palpable; as was, equally, the disappointment of those who had struggled in recent years with earlier technology. Indeed, encouragingly, respondents appeared to be actively seeking opportunities for cost savings and streamlining processes for the services their organisations deliver. Some shining beacons of excellence were highlighted by respondents. Award winning council websites, the Planning Portal and the EU Services Directive were all cited as evidence that the technology had much to offer. So, can this latest generation of eForms technology help deliver the next generation of online government citizen services? Key to the success of engaging those who are digitally able but not yet using online services, plus those currently excluded from the digital world, will be use and integration of widely available technology to deliver engaging, intuitive and trustworthy services.
The ‘eForms in a Digital Britain – Intelligent forms and efficient service delivery’ research project was undertaken by LGITU magazine with the support of the Tomorrow’s Town Hall newsletter, UKauthorITy.com and Adobe. To request a copy email Helen Olsen: helen@infopub.co.uk Local Government IT In Use
The stark truth is that the public sector must deliver more with less. And common sense dictates that harnessing today’s ubiquitous low cost technologies to deliver engaging, efficient services is a necessity.
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SOLACE
Two Parliaments of Pain Chief executives are under no illusions as to the challenges ahead. Helen Olsen reports from Solace 2009. © iStockphoto.com/Marcela Barsse
wo things struck hard at the Solace conference this year for a public sector techy journalist.
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Firstly, the society of local authority chief executive’s annual shindig was overshadowed by the inevitability of deep cuts in public spending. In a straw poll conducted around the delegate hall, chief executives were unanimous in expecting savage cuts to their council’s budgets: “Up to 30% over the next two years.” Delegates are agreed that the colour of the next government is irrelevant - they are preparing for ‘two parliaments of pain’; the budget cupboard is bare. Secondly, despite approximately a third of the exhibitors being technology-related organisations, technology was not a hot topic. Why? Chief executives, again unanimously in the sample spoken to, felt that technology people “did not speak their language”. Setting up a meeting with technology people and suppliers was not top of the list of their concerns. Technology was “a tool wasn’t it?”; we all “know what it can do”. Moreover, unfortunately for the technology industry, phrases such as “dramatically over sold and under-delivered” were oft repeated. That notwithstanding, all agreed that technology, as a tool, had the ability to deliver real benefits to service transformation. It is just that, so far, it hasn’t delivered the promised goods. Everyone has experience of IT projects that are over budget, of systems that don’t work, of efficiency dreams never delivered. And all are wary of the large scale, high profile central government IT disasters. Add in the
unending stream of data losses and it is understandable that chief executives are not looking to technology ‘above all’ to help them through the recession.
learn much from companies like Virgin – which always collaborates on new ventures, never invests; and always looks to partnerships to deliver new services.
Meanwhile, technology people - both inside and outside local government - are still not able to translate the bits and bytes, the widgets and the infrastructures, into plain English that imparts exactly ‘what’ the technology will ‘do’ for local government and provide a solid (and credible) business case to prove it.
Indeed, the airlines were much revered at Solace, with Barnet chief executive, Nick Walkley, later outlining the ‘EasyJet’ model of local service delivery in a lively workshop entitled, “Beyond Efficiency, Leadershp through Two Parliaments of Pain’.
This lack of engagement by the technology community with the wider council has long been discussed. In recent years Socitm has urged its members to ‘take their place at the top table’. So, why has this never happened? To truly help the public sector through the most challenging time of its life, technologists must engage with chief executives and finance directors to outline how, why and where technology can effect change. And provide the evidence - and the business case - to prove it. Meanwhile, chief executives were urged to see the recession as an “opportunity to excel” by speaker and business guru, Rene Carayol. Difficult times, he said, could provide “a moment” to be radical. Success, he said would depend on changing culture, on bringing the organisation with them. He urged chief executives to shift their organisations’ cultures to ones that were “performance driven but values led”. More than ordinary organisations, Carayol reminded his audience, local government had the power to “make a tangible difference to people’s lives”. Carayol suggested that councils could
Solace Enterprises director, Martin Horton, said that the sector was good at innovation but unable to react in the same way as the private sector: “There is so much political and emotional effort invested in innovation by the time you’ve pressed it through.” The political challenge facing chief executives, he said was “the killing of things that we’ve invested in. Difficult, but somehow we must get past that.” One chief executive said that her council was “reframing our questions. What do we actually have to do as bedrock? Whilst we are talking about efficiency we are effectively cutting back on staff capacity. We need to ask, why are we providing pest control? Not, how do we provide pest control.” Indeed, said another, “We must ask, what would our organisation look like with 20 percent less cash? “We are going to have to go back to the big suppliers (BT etc) and have discussions of how they are going to work with the public sector and contribute to the changes – input versus output.” The next two parliaments are going to be painful indeed - for local government, citizens and suppliers to local government.
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SOCITM
Future Prospects Technology has much to offer the council of the future but policy from the centre will determine whether or not that potential delivers, says Michael Cross, reporting from Socitm 09.
dinburgh in October can be bracing – but at least two workshops at this year’s Socitm conference were literal, as well as metaphorical, hot-houses. Sessions on social media and the council of the future both drew more-than capacity audiences.
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The main certainty about the council of the future is that, given the looming pressures of the next spending round (not to mention the next government) it will be with us very soon. Doug Maclean, manager of Socitm Consulting, warned that managers would be living with cuts in budgets not on the mildly belt-tightening Gershon efficiency scale of 3%-5% but “twenty to thirty percent - or even more”. In response, councils will become much more virtual organisations, having rid themselves of expensive and constraining offices and grand buildings. There cannot have been anyone in the room, whatever the colour of their ruling group, who had not already considered what that might mean. Maclean assured the workshop that he had the recipe for making such a transformation. It obviously includes cutting transaction costs by 90% by boosting the use of e-channels (and realising the benefits - for example by throwing out redundant paper rather than paying to store it). But the real savings he said would come from cutting the costs of central offices and of key services. And there’s no point in being half-hearted, he said. “You can’t pick and choose, you have to do the whole picture.”
The feeling from another packed workshop was there is still some way to go. The session heard that, if the council of the future is a Twitterer and Facebooker, about one in 10 local authorities is already there. That is the percentage allowing staff unrestricted access to social networks, according to a preview of Socitm research to be published shortly. However, attendees suggested that any survey based on a self-selecting sample may be biased towards social media enthusiasts. The society’s Vicky Sargent told a workshop entitled ‘Social media - are ICT managers blocking modern ways of working?’ that 49% of councils block access entirely. And yes, ICT managers are often to blame. Leading concerns include security, time-wasting and reputational risk, the survey will show. Not to mention the sheer strain on the network, delegates added. The conference’s plenary speakers certainly reflected the new enthusiasm for Web 2.0. Opening the event, Geoff Mulgan called on the public sector to make a break from “over-engineered and underdelivered” projects by exploring Google and Wiki-type initiatives. David Cameron could not have put it better. The Socitm conference coincided with a refreshing new interest by frontranking politicians in the power of setting data free. As Socitm was meeting a distinctively Tory local government policy was emerging around the power of free data to encourage experiment – and audit.
That possibility isn’t new – the 2009 touch is to connect the electronic municipal panopticon with its citizens through social networking techniques. “Streetlamp HB43 is now following you on Twitter,” perhaps?
As Cameron put it last month: “A necessary counterpart to decentralisation is greater transparency. That’s because information is power, so by giving people more information we give them more power. This is true internationally, where our plans for aid transparency will allow poor people in developing countries to see whether what has been promised is being delivered. And it’s true back home, where our plans to publish details of all central and local government spending will not only provide a powerful check on waste, they will help open up the provision of state services to small businesses, social enterprises or charities as they see what is being done by the state and how they could do better.”
But first, more basic uses of social networking need to be embedded in local government.
However one significant Conservativecontrolled council provided a reality check to the possibilities for local innovation.
Socitm Consulting was not the only organisation promoting wholesale transformation. IBM, meanwhile, presented a vision of a ‘smart’ council in which the commoditisation of sensors makes it affordable to measure the condition of everything. ‘Through sensors embedded in cars, appliances, roads, pipelines, even medicine and livestock, we can know where they are, their condition and even see what they are seeing.’
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Birmingham city’s experience of piloting the government’s Total Place concept has revealed the need for radical reforms in public funding and governance, Jason Lowther, director of policy and delivery, told a plenary session. He said the city has identified seven barriers to organising services around individual citizens rather than organisations. Top of the list was “short term financial horizons” making it impossible to create a business case for early interventions. “We need to talk to Treasury about paybacks over a ten to fifteen year period,” Lowther said. Every pound Birmingham spends on early intervention in child welfare saves £4 over 15 years, he added, “But three quarters of those savings will accrue to organisations other than the city.” Meanwhile, a “plethora of conflicting performance management regimes is hindering joint working”. Lowther described as “a betrayal of trust” the Home Office and Department of Health’s retention of specific performance management measures, rather than relying on the local area agreement. He said that the administration is “very upfront” about reducing the city’s £7.5bn annual expenditure. “Unashamedly this is about saving money as well as about improving services.” Cameron and his policy makers might do well to examine Birmingham’s experience closely before setting too many new policies in stone. The council of the future may emerge through the dynamics of drastic budget cuts coupled with free data and new technologies. But it will also need some strategic helping hands from the centre. Local Government IT Excellence Awards 2009 Service Transformation Award - Cheshire West and Chester Council for its Revenues and Benefits Systems Convergence project. Sustainable ICT Award - Hampshire County Council for the Green IT Action Plan. Customer Access Award - London Borough of Hackney for its Citizen Index project. Highly Commended - Flintshire County Council for its Green, Agile and Efficient project. Highly Commended - Crawley Borough Council for its Streamlined Customer Transactions through Integration and Tracking project. Graham Williamson Challenge Award IT assistant, Scott Mansfield, from Leeds City Council’s web team, won this year’s award.
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SOCIAL MEDIA
Time to Engage Social media must engage with public sector decision makers if projects are to survive the recession, says Helen Olsen. © iStockphoto.com/Mark Rakocy
ocial media is at a cross roads. Like many on the web frontier, social media advocates are beginning to realise that ‘free’ as a business model is not always sustainable.
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Yes, the internet is free. Unfortunately, that means that no one wants to pay for it. For any of it: for its creation, its use or its maintenance. And with savage public sector budget cuts on the horizon the public sector funding pot is drying up too. All councils now have websites. All are aiming to move service delivery to the most cost effective e-channels where appropriate. All will now have to make difficult decisions about where future investment is made. And the business case that is so far missing in the social media tool box could be a major block to gaining future funding. Chief executives at Solace last month that were interested in technology were few and far between. However, those that were had a surprisingly laissez-faire attitude. When the topic came up in a workshop, under Chatham House Rule, one chief urged colleagues: “Don’t build your own web 2.0 community. Don’t bother. Someone else in the community will do it for you.” Delegates were interested in how they could re-use, or hook into, already developed resources without funding development in their own councils. “Take the fix my street website, it’s already been developed and works. We should be able to drive that forwards and pump the information into all the relevant agencies –
to generate our own works orders - rather than reinvent our own solution.”
finance directors and chief executives in the audience at these events.
Many were dismissive of current council websites, branding them “little more than virtual town halls replicated on the web. The real version doesn’t work, so why would the ‘e’ version of the corridors and the cliques?”
Indeed, almost half (49%) of all councils block social media use entirely, according to Socitm. Only nine percent allow unrestricted use. Councils’ – aka council heads of IT – main concerns were security, time wasting and reputational risk.
The chief executives’ conference obsession with airlines – EasyJet and Virgin were mentioned daily – has an interesting underlying point. The business of flying hasn’t changed, but the model for its provision has. Ergo British Airway’s devastating losses (and subsequent merger with Iberia) clearly highlighting the danger in adhering to the ‘traditional model’ in times of change.
It is painfully apparent that the social media message is not getting through to those with the power to effect change. They don’t ‘get’ it. But that is not their fault. ‘It’ has never laid out its case in convincing and engaging terms. If the social media community does not start to network externally - and build a community - with the chief executives, finance directors and traditional council heads of IT, there is a very real danger that the enormous potential of social media will never be realised.
Interestingly, the two lessons taken from Virgin and EasyJet are radical steps away from traditional models – partnerships not investments for new services; and stripping services down to the essentials to deliver efficiency and open up access to all. Social media has enormous potential. It can build relationships and networks and communities. It has the potential to add value to many public services and become a key part of service delivery such as taking the burden off frontline workers of forever providing the same information. But like any other community it can become inward facing. It is striking that the same, incredibly talented and, well, thoroughly nice, people attend the same social media events – that are always bursting with the same ideas and potential. It is also striking that there is a lack of council heads of IT,
Enthusiasm and commitment will always build communities. Hyperlocal blogging does indeed have its own drivers. And all online communities have massive benefit for their members. But only a solid business case and engagement will deliver funding for the creation of sustainable communities that deliver real citizen engagement and two-way communication between the electorate, civil servants or politicians - that give value to both sides of the provider/user divide. The internet may be free, but time and resource is not. Until the banks give out free money and the supermarkets free food, people still have an economic imperative to be paid for their time.
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With RightNow’s innovative new CX (Customer Experience) suite, you can ensure that citizens’ minor irritations never become major revolts. Citizens have always enjoyed airing their views. But now, social networking has created a wider forum for them to share their thoughts and opinions regarding your service delivery. Something that is being put more under the microscope each and every day. To ensure that you address the ever evolving expectations of your citizens you need to deliver great experiences across their web, social and contact centre interactions to transform rigid customer service processes into dynamic real-time dialogues. With RightNow CX you can stay ahead of the game and in touch with people’s needs by listening to them, responding to what they say and adapting your policies and processes to meet changing needs. In keeping the citizen experience at the centre of everything you do, RightNow CX allows you to deliver real citizen-centric services by concentrating on the three experiences that matter most to them. The web experience, the social experience and the contact centre experience. RightNow Web Experience lets people find the services they’re looking for quickly and easily using engaging and appealing online tools like chat and web self-service. RightNow Social Experience keeps you in touch with conversations about your local authority on social networks, and lets you bond with citizens in your own community networking space. RightNow Contact Centre Experience seamlessly integrates your contact centre channels, to allow citizens to access your services in the way, and at the time, that suits them best. The result? You can now identify emerging trends for investigation and take appropriate action in real time, while prioritising the conversations that could escalate from minor irritations into major revolts.
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WESTMINSTER
Digital Divide Splits Parliament Tim Hampson reports from Westminster. ©iStockphoto.com/S. Greg Panosian
hey say that a house divided is an unhappy house. Well there cannot be many people unhappier than most of the current occupants of the Houses of Parliament.
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In particular the Commons is a melancholic place. Members are internally seething about the new rules on expenses, and most are still unable to grasp the public’s anger at their claims. Add to this the fact that half of them are counting the days either to retirement or unemployment and even the most hard nosed cannot be unmoved by the sight of colleagues shuffling down the corridors of power, muttering, “I’ve done nothing wrong”. However, if anything unites even despondent MPs it is a statement by a government minister, not in the Commons but in the other house. One of the curiosities of what was once perceived as a radical government is that there are now more members of the House of Lords acting as government ministers than in the Cabinet of the silver spooned Alexander Frederick Douglas-Home, Baron Home of the Hirsel who was prime minster for 12 months from October 1963. Douglas-Home was the only prime minister to have played first class cricket. However if around today he could have watched Baron Peter Mandelson bowling a googly in a statement on internet file sharing. The business minister wants to cut off illegal file sharers’ internet connections. The twice resurrected minister says that the government plans to look at increased action against illegal down-loaders, including potentially suspending the accounts of persistent offenders. From July 2011 if a 70% reduction in online piracy is not achieved by sending “warning letters”, customers will have their connection subjected to technical measures. Which to you and me means they will be cut off. Quite how this will be done remains unclear. The idea of disconnection was seemingly ruled out by the government’s Digital Britain report published in June. But if a week is a long time in politics then summertime is an eternity – more than enough time for music and film industry barons to bend the ear of the business minister while sharing a water cooler 13
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moment with him in one of parliament’s corridors. Unsurprisingly the statement has angered the internet service providers. Carphone Warehouse, which has more than four million customers and owns the Tiscali and AOL brands, said that the government’s plan was based on file-sharers being “guilty until proven innocent” and constituted an infringement of human rights. BT shrugged a massive corporate shoulder, yawned, and said it would take action if the government could outline what legal action would be taken against its customers. Other antagonists shouted, “What about the ‘human rights’ of file sharers?” Such statements meet little sympathy in the Commons – too many MPs are still smarting at having their expenses files shared with the Daily Telegraph and then cruelly exposed to the oxygen of publicity. But while the MPs procrastinated, few took much note of the series of parliamentary questions asked by former e-minister, Tom Watson. The technologically aware MP asked a series of written questions on civil service plans to upgrade their web browsers from Internet Explorer version 6. The West Bromwich MP laid 18 questions before the house – asking different secretaries of state for their departments’ upgrade plans. On the face of it a simple question. The IE6 browser is widely regarded as technically insecure and at least 10 years out of date. However, forget upgrading and modernisations, say its proponents, “We are happy with what we got and what we haven’t got won’t cost us.” Both central government and local authorities are still big users of IE6 even though government advice is that it is an insecure medium. However, the way things are going the London Olympics will have come and gone and most government departments will still be using old legacy IE6 browsers. Tom Watson wasn’t happy. “Many civil servants use web browsers as a tool of their trade. They’re as important as pens and paper. So to force them to use the most decrepit browser in the world is a rare form of workplace cruelty that should be stopped,” he said. The government’s advice seems Local Government IT In Use
unequivocal; it says companies should upgrade from IE6. So why are government and local authorities not practicing what is being preached? Shouldn’t more be using Firefox or Chrome or Safari? Mandelson seems more concerned with hoodies and silver surfers downloading illegal music files than the fact that the British government and local authorities are underperforming because they are using a web browser first developed before Tony Blair was spun into life and became prime minister. Perhaps the MPs about to leave parliament should ponder this - when they sit at home surfing the web, the chances are their home computer will have the most up to date browsing software, unlike the public servants they have denied it to.
Broadband tax cant details of what will be in the S digital economy Bill were announced in the Queen’s speech. “My government will introduce a Bill to ensure communications infrastructure that is fit for the digital age, supports future economic growth, delivers competitive communications and enhances public service broadcasting,” the Queen said. But details of the expected phone line tax, to raise the money so that 90% of the population can access government websites from home by 2017 using broadband, were absent. But that doesn’t mean the idea is dead. The announcement will be made in the government’s pre-budget statement with 50p charged on everyone with a fixed-line telephone. However, will a government counting the days towards a general election introduce a tax for surfing the web? The Tories are certainly against the idea. Tory MP John Whittingdale says he is confident the Conservative party will oppose it. But don’t discount the idea of Labour pushing on with the mouse tax, but setting a date for its introduction after the election. By then the next government will need every penny raised in tax – and the measure will probably stay in place.
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EMERGENCY SERVICES
Mobile - empowering the front line obile devices, says Bedfordshire police inspector, Jim Hitch, are merely the next step in police communications – following on from the whistle, police box and the 2-way radio. He does not see their introduction so much as a technology project but as a cultural change: “It’s about getting people to work differently.”
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At a roundtable organised by Research in Motion (RIM), Hitch reported that Bedfordshire officer ‘time-in-station’ had dropped by nearly a quarter to just 36% of duty time following introduction of BlackBerry mobile technology – and that each device cost just £270 a year per officer. This impressive improvement in efficiency was echoed by Keith Gough, mobile information manager at Thames Valley Police, who said that introduction of the technology had saved the equivalent to “one hundred extra officers on the street”. Gough pointed out that PNC checks over Airwave take an average of three minutes and involve two members of staff - one back at the station doing the check - while those on mobile devices could run the check themselves, instantly. The National Police Improvement Agency’s (NPIA) mobile information programme manager, Gary Cairns, says that NPIA is looking at whether one mobile device can meet voice and data comms requirements after the current Airwave police radio network agreement expires in 2015. What that device may be is still under investigation, but it is safe to say it will be a device that combines the qualities of both today’s mobile data devices and Airwave radio communications. Indeed, the long term aim of the NPIA’s Future Communications Programme is to converge access to police ICT systems to enable one access point for officers to the information
they need, when they need it, where they need it. David Davies, Conservative MP for Monmouth and, pertinently, a special constable with the British Transport Police, sits on the Home Affairs Select Committee. He confirmed that a future Conservative government would undoubtedly oversee cuts in public sector spending. Therefore a convincing business case for mobile devices demonstrating that they can save money in the long term would be needed, he said, to secure short term investment. However, he added that as a special constable “I have seen the benefits of mobile data and it is something I would want to support.” Mobile devices such as the BlackBerry, approved by CESG to carry data up to ‘restricted’ levels, allow quick and secure access to information from the Police National Computer (PNC), the warrants database, intelligence briefings, and the DVLA database. To date the government has handed out £80m via the NPIA to enable forces to trial such devices. NPIA says that around half of all police officers currently carry one. RIM estimates approximately 39,000 devices are in use today by UK police forces – around half of these are Blackberry smartphones. Culture, however, is a major issue. Hitch estimates that around 80-85% of devices handed out are heavily used. The remainder are not. When pressed, he confirmed that lack of uptake was more prevalent among older officers who were not comfortable with the technology. Encouraging universal use of new technology is a major block to delivering promised efficiency savings – the police are not alone in encountering this problem.
ncident reporting rolls out nationally: incolnshire Police has implemented IT IRescue L National deployment of the Fire and service management software Service Incident Recording System Sostenuto, from Sunrise Software. It is is complete, with FRS able to use it to log, store and disseminate attended incident data. Developed by Informed Solutions in cooperation with CLG, the fully automated data capture and data sharing system enables data on all incidents attended by FRSs to be collected and verified at source.
working towards ITIL accreditation, in line with the NPIA ‘Information Systems Strategy for the Police Service’ directive, which lays down a framework to improve police performance and efficiencies.
Police can keep records for 100 years ive police forces which challenged a Fcriminal ruling that they should delete records on convictions from their database have won their appeal. The court of appeal said that convictions, however old and however minor, can be of value in the fight against crime and could be kept for 100 years. If the forces had lost their appeal they may have been forced to delete details of as many as one million people – effectively creating a “liars’ charter” where people would be able to deny criminal convictions on job applications if they knew the deletion deadline had passed. The appeal was made by the chief constables of Humberside, Staffordshire, Northumbria, West Midlands and Greater Manchester. nion and Tories criticise plans for fire service reorganisation: Plans for nine U regional hi-tech fire control centres based on the Government Office Regions, replacing 46 local control rooms, will lead to a worse service, fire fighters and the Conservatives have warned. The move will lead to the loss of local knowledge, which fire fighters warn could lead to delays. The FireControl project, originally established by John Prescott, is years behind schedule, beset by technical problems and more than £400m over its original £1bn budget. The Tories have called for it to be scrapped and alternatives investigated - such as the triservice centre model used in Gloucestershire which draws together all three local emergency services under one roof. rime maps to ward level: The Home Office has launched a new interactive C national map collating data from the 43 individual police force crime maps - giving the public access to local statistics and details on crime in their area. Developed by the NPIA, the online map allows people to view figures for all crime as well as burglary, robbery, violence, vehicle crime and anti-social behaviour in their area at the touch of a button. It also enables comparisons of one force’s figures with another, and provides details of neighbourhood police teams and local policing priorities. http://maps.police.uk
Reducing travel to maximise inspections
est use of technology: Cambridgeshire GP Systems has launched an B Constabulary and Forensic Pathways G innovative route planner for UK fire scooped the Orange Best Use of and rescue services. Designed to reduce Technology in Business category at the National Business Awards for using FPL’s Forensic Phone Analyser system to drastically increase and improve its ability to manage intelligence. The system can manage billions of items of data relating to mobile phone and telecommunications networks, helping investigators make sense of, and use, it to identify and catch criminals.
travelling times and costs and maximise the number of building inspections made by fire safety inspectors, GGP Routing utilises the most up to date street maps to ensure optimal routing taking into account a range of user defined options, road network characteristics and other www.ggpsystems.co.uk variables. Local Government IT In Use
November/December 2009
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NEW PRODUCTS
Handheld for harsh environments obexx has launched an ultra rugged and powerful hand held computer designed for use in harsh public safety, security and field engineering environments. The 2T Hydrus provides reliable computing for the harshest of environments and offers a wide range of expansion options, including RFID readers, custom configuration and colours. A Xenon flash equipped version - Hydrus Luna – is also available for taking high quality photographs in poorly lit premises, dark warehouses and even under overcast skies. The Hydrus has one of the largest capacity batteries available on the market, providing up to 40 hours of working time for field-based applications.
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www.mobexx.co.uk
hiny clean Windows 7: The new version of Microsoft’s PC operating system, Windows 7, has launched to much acclaim, being cited by The Guardian as “the best version of Windows you can get”. Indeed, “like Vista, but good”. It uses fewer resources than Vista and is more secure than XP. A reduced footprint and optimisation also means it boots, sleeps and wakes up faster than previous versions. Microsoft has tried hard to make Windows 7 deliver on a simple premise: make it easier for people to do the things they want on a PC. The new operating system offers a streamlined user interface and significant new features that make everyday tasks easier and allow people to get the most out of computers of all styles and sizes. www.windows.com
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Seek and ye shall find
Gritting in real-time asternaut Three X and GRITIT have M developed a unique web-based solution for gritting operations. VisuLive uses Masternaut’s real-time vehicle tracking and telematics plus PDA-based mobile field service software and realtime business intelligence solution to generate jobs in response to MORST (Met Office Road Surface Temperature) www.masternaut.co.uk reports. dobe LiveCycle Enterprise Suite 2: The apMechanics has launched GeoXploit, a complete mapping M A latest version of Adobe’s LiveCycle software and data package with powerful rich internet application framework includes mobile access, Flash based workspaces and cloud deployment to deliver applications for business-critical customer interactions. Organisations can deliver personalised experiences that connect to automated processes and embed real-time collaboration in applications to improve customer experience and boost employee productivity. www.adobe.com/livecycle calable licence for NLPG: The National S Land and Property Gazetteer can now be licensed for smaller geographical areas, which brings down the cost considerably for organisations such as housing associations and primary care trusts. Until recently, subsets of the definitive national address database were only available commercially by Government Office Region. NLPG data can now be licensed based on local authority boundaries with pricing based on the number of BLPUs (Basic Land and Property Unit) in the area. Trafford Housing Trust is the first to take advantage of the new pricing structure.
understanding of housing market issues and trends in local areas. The Housing Market Analysis Tool provides a range of indicators, allowing users to look at issues in local housing markets, as well as demographic change, levels of deprivation, the local economy and local environment. www.audit-commission.gov.uk eat loss maps: Bluesky has launched H an easy-to-use property heat loss mapper to help local authorities view thermal data collected during airborne thermal imaging surveys. The HELIOS (Heat Loss Investigation System) web based reporting tool, developed by Manchester Geomatics, will help energy and environment teams understand the results of thermal surveys and allow cross referencing of data with other information. www.bluesky-world.com
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November/December 2009
nisys is to use Enigmatec’s run book automation software to power a key U infrastructure component of its Secure Cloud Solution. It will form the foundation for Unisys uOrchestrate solutions, which powers the real-time infrastructure supporting Unisys Secure Cloud Solution. This will enable enterprise clients to securely move conventional business applications – including those with secure or sensitive data – into a managed, shared cloud service without costly, timeconsuming rewrites or other alterations. www.unisys.com
www.enigmatec.com
www.intelligent-addressing.co.uk
implexo has launched Simplexo ousing market analysis: The Audit S Mobile, a new way to search for data H Commission has launched a userheld on back office computers when out friendly online tool to increase on the road. Available now for the iPhone, Windows Mobile 6 devices and Blackberrys, Simplexo Mobile can simultaneously search across all enterprise environments including SharePoint, live and archived email, word processing documents, images, spreadsheets, databases, applications such as CRM and SAP.
presentational, thematic and analytical capabilities. Using a range of inclusive, pre-configured digital map data, and supporting business and demographic data, users can bypass the usual learning curve of such products. GeoXploit costs £3,495 + VAT - including ready-to-use UK street mapping and licensed access to aerial photography, plus a range of maprelated data such as population and social class data, postcodes and business delivery points. www.geoxploit.com
Local Government IT In Use
Web based GIS GP Systems has launched the latest version of its web based geographic G information system, eGGP 2009. Designed to make up to the minute local authority service information readily accessible via the internet, it provides access to data held in spatial database formats and has a newlook user interface with advanced mapping functionality. A faster more refined online experience is underpinned by a reworked map rendering engine. eGGP 2009 also provides improved security with sophisticated user authentification and account management. www.ggpsystems.co.uk
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CONTRACT ROUNDUP
orset County Council-commissioned Buro Happold used Bluesky 3D mapping to help prepare a feasibility study into bypass options for Bere Regis. The detailed terrain model enabled designers to minimise any impact on the environment, particularly the associated costs of cut and fill operations, for the three proposed options.
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ity of Westminster has upgraded to Axiell’s fully managed CalmView service to manage its archives collection. This also offers internet access to its WestCat archives collection comprising books, pamphlets, directories, newspapers, journals, maps and plans, drawings, photographs, local government records from 1460, electoral registers, census returns, parish registers, and business archives.
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lyde Valley Learning and Development Group, covering eight Scottish councils, has asked Brightwave to deliver a new e-learning service over the next three years.
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orby Borough Council has deployed a new voice and LAN infrastructure based on an Alcatel-Lucent Omni PCX Enterprise system from Indigo Telecom Group.
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oventry City Council buyers are testing new single-click access through their existing PROACTIS system to contractors’ PQQ data on Constructionline.
C nglesey and Gwynedd Local Health Boards have launched a joint Tunstall telehealth monitoring home service to record vital signs, such as blood pressure and O2 levels for patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.
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rent Council is the first local authority to implement UKMap for key location and base map data for a number of core applications, including planning and transportation. Savings have already been identified in the first year to make the purchase cost-neutral.
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ristol City Council is achieving 60% operational cost reductions using ASG Software’s tape management and console automation for its IBM infrastructure.
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ast Sussex County Council has bought Nuance Communications PDF Converter Professional Enterprise 6, gaining a ‘procurement saving in excess of £16,000’, and negating the need for the council to invest in separate redaction software.
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lasgow Housing Association has installed an advanced network from ntl:Telewest Business, providing customers with a single number to call its new contact centre as well as arming frontline staff with up-to-date information to answer queries.
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alderdale Council residents can soon go online to see the heat loss from their properties, following airborne surveys by aerial mapping firm, Bluesky.
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ardiff Council expects to save £1.3m in its transport of children with special education needs after adopting Capita Children’s Services’ One Transport and using the information to renegotiate contracts with transport providers.
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entral and Eastern Cheshire PCT has spearheaded a new shared IT solution, MedisecNET, to cut delays between a patient leaving hospital and their GP receiving detailed discharge notes. It is being used by three acute trusts to provide discharge documentation to 92 GPs.
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nverclyde, North Ayrshire and South Ayrshire councils have entered into five year agreements to promote high quality benefits services to over 331,000 citizens with Northgate. Northgate’s revenues and benefits system is to be integrated with the councils’ implementations under the Scottish National Framework Agreement.
undee City Council has tightened security for remote workers with SecurAccess from SecurEnvoy. Passcodes sent to workers’ mobile phones are now entered alongside usual login details to access networks and emails remotely.
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ardiff Council has asked Tata Consultancy Services to provide workflow and business processes to augment information and knowledge management organisation-wide and help build operational intelligence.
ounslow Council is working with PlanNet to identify current areas of good practice and compliance and provide the council with an opportunity to map out clearly defined IT improvement objectives.
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erbyshire County Council has asked Lumension to help it gain complete visibility of the security of its 8,000 IT endpoints across 430 locations.
usiness Link West Midlands has deployed Datanomic’s dn:Director data management application to improve the accuracy of data held in its CRM. The system is central to BLWM’s reporting processes with central government.
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ighland Council has awarded Fujitsu preferred bidder status for a new five year, £66m ICT services contract. Fujitsu will manage the council’s entire ICT estate, including additional scope for curriculum ICT to schools.
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erefordshire Council and NHS Herefordshire’s Herefordshire Connects transformation programme has delivered a new integrated environment and regeneration system from Civica. The solution is streamlining the delivery of waste management, planning, environmental health, trading standards, licensing, building controls, conservation and housing, among other services. It is the biggest project undertaken by Civica in 20 years.
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reat Western Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust has used InterSystems’ Ensemble integration platform to link nine applications, including Electronic Discharge Summary and Theatre systems, with data from its Patient Administration System. ammersmith and Fulham Primary Care Trust has asked Fordway Solutions to design and install a new storage and disaster recovery infrastructure to handle anticipated data growth - whilst reducing both server space and power consumption. The server count has been reduced by 60%.
pswich Borough Council is using Optimum to deliver user training around a major upgrade of its finance system. “We did the mass user training ourselves when we went live in 2007 but we recognised that it was a struggle because we lacked the resource and we weren’t professional trainers,” said Adrian Powell, Ipswich’s project manager. HS Shared Business Services, a joint venture between the Department of Health and Steria, has announced a further eight new contract wins with NHS organisations, totalling 17 new customers since April 2009. The partnerships will deliver finance and accounting and payroll shared services with a combined value of more than £12m and extend the payroll service to approximately 25,000 more NHS employees.
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ampshire Primary Care Trust has selected Real Asset Management’s Asset4000 to manage its £150m worth of assets and provide a centralised register.
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avering Council has asked Civica to help an internal team implement an organisation-wide efficiency saving programme using the workflow and electronic document management capabilities of Civica’s W2 product.
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Local Government IT In Use
November/December 2009
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CONTRACT ROUNDUP HS Kensington and Chelsea PCT has chosen Siemens Enterprise Communications’ single voice and secure data network to provide communications to eight PCT and partner locations.
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HS Oxfordshire has selected INOVEM’s Inclusionware software, a secure online environment accessed using various levels of role-based access control, to ensure that consultation managers, administrators and stakeholders see only what is appropriate and relevant to them.
N outh Wales Trunk Road Agency, in a bid to keep the traffic moving smoothly, is using software from Mayrise Systems to manage inspections, monitor and coordinate ongoing road works and plan for special events.
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nowsley Housing Trust has chosen 1st Touch to deliver mobile solutions integrated with IBS OPENHousing and OPTI-TIME scheduling systems. It interfaces in real-time with an Xmbrace scheduling system OPTI-TIME and IBS OPENHousing system currently in use.
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ewisham Borough Business Against Crime is using National Business Information System, web-based data sharing technology from Hicom, enabling it to track and produce detailed reports and analysis on criminal activity in the area.
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ole Valley District Council has contracted Becrypt to provide a range of security solutions, enabling it to meet GCSX CoCo requirements. Currently undergoing pilot projects, the council intends to roll out to all remote home workers across the district once complete.
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HS West Midlands Ambulance Service is using BlockMaster’s USB SafeSticks from Softek to provide staff with complete security through automatic hardware encryption. It is also using the SafeConsole web based management solution to manage, audit, reset passwords and apply custom policies to all SafeSticks.
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ottingham University Hospital Trust has deployed a customised CNodes reporting solution across 15 specialist tumour departments.
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xfordshire County Council has asked Pirean Compliance:One to securely manage access to software applications for over 100,000 students and staff and help it meet critical GCSX and DPA targets whilst streamlining access to digital resources at the county’s 285 educational facilities.
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HS Cheshire and Wirral Partnership Foundation Trust has asked the ANS Group to implement an external email encryption system.
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HS City and Hackney has chosen Egress Switch to protect information wherever it goes using strong encryption and identity based access rights without introducing complex procedures for users.
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HS Dudley is installing telehealth systems from Tunstall to help monitor people’s health at home. The new service is being offered to patients with long-term conditions and allows them to have their health managed remotely by nursing staff.
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HS Greater Glasgow and Clyde Health Board has implemented Orion Health’s electronic health record solution using Concerto Portal technology. The trust’s Scott Hendry said, “People see the benefit in moving away from paper but, to work, a portal needs to be as effective and easy as a paper-based system.”
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HS Hounslow has appointed Capita IT Services its ICT managed services provider in a three year £3.3m contract. Capita will deliver end-to-end outsourced ICT service to over 1,200 users across NHS Hounslow’s commissioning and provider service arms and general practitioners.
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HS South West Essex Community Services has deployed 21c’s Microsoft Business Intelligence solution. By enhancing the existing Microsoft infrastructure and leveraging the national NHS agreement with Microsoft, it has improved the efficiency, cost and accuracy of the trust’s reporting.
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November/December 2009
lymouth City Council has gone live with six ITIL disciplines and is introducing improvements to existing and new processes using elements of both ITIL v2 and v3 with Hornbill’s Supportworks ITSM. edcar and Cleveland Borough Council has signed up for Liquidlogic’s children’s system, PROTOCOL ICS, and is currently migrating data from existing children’s case management systems to PROTOCOL. oyal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea has bought Hornbill’s Supportworks ITSM to improve service delivery.
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outh Ayrshire Council towns will be the first to benefit from super fast fibre optic connectivity via a Fibrezone ring being built by H2O Networks.
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hurrock Thames Gateway Development Corporation’s CIO, Jason Oliver (right), is looking forward to using Equiniti ICS’s Electronic Document Record Management System to deliver greater operational efficiencies for the corporation and secure compliance with Data Protection and FoI requirements.
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Local Government IT In Use
outh Lanarkshire Council is using Jadu to replace its existing web infrastructure and future proof its investment. “Web technology, design, functionality and accessibility standards have all moved on significantly in the last few years and our current web development products have not kept pace,” said Andrew Proctor, project manager at South Lanarkshire.
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outh London Healthcare NHS Trust is deploying business intelligence tools from Ardentia - Data Warehouse, Pathway Manager and NetSearch - in order to support merger activities and help improve trust performance.
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outh Oxfordshire District Council has been working with Ocella during the development phase of the first Connector for the Planning Portal e-Consultation Hub. Angie Paterson, cabinet member for planning, said that the council was looking forward to reaping the benefits of the e-Consultation Hub. “We are proud to be leading the way as the first fully connected LPA using the Hub.”
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outh West Regional Library Service is working with OCLC to enable seven public library authorities in the South West to use WorldCat Local as their shared end user discovery service in 2010.
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orbay Council has upgraded its operations with a high capacity broadband connection from Eclipse Internet. The Eclipse 30Mbps DIA is an upgrade from the council’s old 4Mbps DIA, and can be increased to 100Mbps.
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rafford Housing Trust is to adopt Lagan’s Enterprise Case Management solution to support its strategic transformation programme. Using NDL’s universal integration platform to access core central applications the trust will integrate front and back office operations, thus streamlining interaction with customers, contractors and other agencies.
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elwyn Hatfield Borough Council has asked GOSS Interactive to design and build its new website. Ongoing, the site will be managed in-house by the council’s web team using GOSS iCM.
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est Sussex County Council has opted for Atos Healthcare for its Occupational Health department. The company will provide a range of on and off-site services that will include pre-employment, management referrals, vaccinations, health promotion and the appropriate support for Fire and Rescue teams.
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SHOWCASE Bluesky
MAYRISE
GGP
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