On 4 March, techUK held the Public Services Conference 2030, which bought together over 100 leaders from public and private sector to debate the potential technology has to revolutionise public services.
The significance of this topic to the government was reflected by Rt Hon Francis Maude MP, the Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General, who delivered the keynote speech at the event.
In his speech, the minister recognised the "significant transition" government has made in embracing digital in recent years. He highlighted that the UK has "set about building a more digital government, underpinned by a strong commitment to competition." He reinforced this by giving a clear message to industry: whether companies were "big or small, established or disruptive, if you're providing the right product at the right price, then we'll do business with you." He noted that new initiatives like the G-Cloud framework and the Digital Marketplace have "helped to open up government contracts to a constellation of new suppliers of all sizes and in all places" across the UK.
At the core of his speech was Maude’s claim that the UK government would be modernising both "the way the government provides its service to the public and [its] operating model" – calling it Government as a Platform. He claimed that this new approach would "help departments focus on their core business, without having to build every single component of a service from scratch."
The minister clearly set a precedent for the conference, as this topic featured in all the debates that followed, which focused specifically on four disruptive technologies: Internet of Things, Mobile Internet, Data Analytics and Cloud.
In each of the panel debates, the audience was invited not only to question the expert speakers, but also to vote on the issues of the day. When asked which of the four technologies they thought presented the greatest opportunity to the public sector, the results were very close: Data Analytics and mobile internet were out in front, with 35% and 34% of the votes respectively, with Internet of Things and Cloud slightly behind on 16% and 15%.
What became clear throughout the day was the significant challenges that must be overcome if public services are to be transformed. This is best illustrated by a vote by the public sector attendees – an overwhelming 51% considered internal culture to be the biggest obstacle in adopting new technologies within their departments or agencies.
The day ended with a presentation from Mark Thompson, who called for the revolution of public services. Thompson believes that the choice presented to the electorate of cuts to public services or increased taxes is a false one – by harnessing the efficiencies technology can generate, Government can deliver the same or better services at a much reduced cost.
The public sector has made some progress along this road and the Chancellor’s Budget confirmed the government’s commitment to the digitisation of our public services. As Maude said in his opening speech, "driving down cost in government while improving the standard of services to the public" has been a key priority for the last five years and "digitalisation has been the essential component of this."
We recognise the role industry has in this transformation, and so last year we asked 1200 civil servants what they needed from us to help with their mission to transform public service delivery through digital technology. We used what they told us to put together a Three Point Plan which calls
For better engagement between industry and Government, better use of the public sector's information and more innovation in public services delivery to provide better services at a lower cost to the taxpayer. techUK is now asking the Government to work with industry to implement this plan.