The Government Digital Service, Central Digital and Data Office and Incubator for AI will all move from the Cabinet Office to the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, it has been announced.
The machinery of government changes “will unite efforts in the digital transformation of public services under one department”, DSIT said in a press release announcing the shift.
The reforms are part of a plan to make DSIT the “digital centre of government”.
DSIT will become “the partner and standard bearer for government departments as it supports them to use technology across areas like energy, health, policing, and education”, it said
The department will also help to upskill civil servants to enable them to use digital and AI more effectively in their frontline work, and ensure government has the right infrastructure and regulation to become more digital.
In this leadership role, DSIT will work closely with the Cabinet Office and the Treasury “to maximise the potential of digital, data and technology to deliver for the British public”, it said.
Announcing the changes, technology secretary Peter Kyle said: “Britain will not fully benefit from the social and economic potential of science and technology without government leading by example. So, DSIT is to become the centre for digital expertise and delivery in government, improving how the government and public services interact with citizens.
“We will act as a leader and partner across government, with industry and the research communities, to boost Britain’s economic performance and power up our public services to improve the lives and life chances of people through the application of science and technology.”
The department said the new approach “will drive forward the digital changes needed to overhaul the British public’s experience of interacting with the government, so it becomes personalised, convenient, and timesaving”.
It said one example of this would be “providing people with just one way to login and prove who they are so they can quickly access the government services they need”, otherwise known as One Login – the system introduced in 2021 that has been implemented in around 30 government services so far.
Moving the Cabinet Office organisations to DSIT will also help to remove roadblocks to sharing data across the public sector, according to the announcement
GDS was formed by the Cabinet Office in 2011 as part of then coalition government's "digital by default" reforms. The CDDO was created a decade later, in early 2021, to lead tech strategy across departments. The i.AI was set up less than a year ago by then-Cabinet Office secretary Oliver Dowden as a “hit squad” to push the use of artificial intelligence across the civil service and a “significant downward driver” on the size of the civil service.
As GDS prepares to move, it has named an interim leader following Tom Read's departure last month. Christine Bellamy, the former director of GOV.UK, will lead the organisation until a permanent chief executive is found.