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Publish Date : 20-Mar-2015

The government has pledged to bolster Whitehall digital capability to help reduce fears of an over-dependence on outsourcing through models like service towers. The Cabinet Office has announced that it will take time for moving away from a legacy of "over-outsourced" ICT contracts as the government aims for a more pragmatic approach to digital service delivery defined by user demands instead of specific procurement models like using towers.

Deputy director and chief of staff in the Office of the Chief Technology Officer, Alex Holmes, said it was key for each department to have "adequate capability to meet their aims, rather than favoring outsourcing strategic decision making or service accountability,", when defining state best policy on providing services to the public.

He added : "As we have historically outsourced a lot of this, growing it again has been a challenge, but one we are overcoming - we now have a great set of digital and technology leaders across government and the Government Digital Service (GDS) Recruitment Hub continues to help departments bring in the right talent at senior levels." In his comments, published on the state technology blog this week, Homes wants to clarify a post he wrote in February criticising the use by departments of the service tower procurement model.

While also "usually outsourcing" service accountability, architecture and management to a third party, Holmes had then said the model failed to work and could not consider services required by departments or the way they would fit together. In its response, technology supplier group techUK said it was "surprised and concerned" about what seemed to be a major policy change being announced in a blog post "without any opportunity for industry consultation".

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