Local government IT enters its most challenging decade “ever”

Local government IT managers, beware. Brace yourselves for “the most challenging decade any of [you] will probably ever experience”.

The stark warning comes from keynote speakers at this week's Socitm conference, where the reality of life delivering ICT in the local public sector context in a post May 6 political climate was laid bare.

Speakers including outgoing head of the body Steve Palmer, CIO at Hillingdon Council in London, ex-council Chief Executive Michael Frater and Socitm Head of Policy Martin Ferguson told an often sombre gathering how the good times are definitely over.

Palmer, speaking of what he sees an upcoming “formidable revenue gap,” called on Socitm members to grasp the nettle of the sector's ongoing poor management of information as a key tool to deal with the growing chorus of politicians convinced the way to win votes is to promise “easily achieved savings in the back office”.

For Palmer, the scenario can be seen as either an opportunity or “bleak” - but that in either case, the best response was to show “leadership” and finally “earn that place at the top table we have so long aspired to”. ICT should be in the driving seat of any and all attempts by councils to save money - “in a way, our time has come” - but the problem was convincing peers and service managers IT people have what it takes, he warned.

Frater, who has had successful roles at bodies such as Telford & Wrekin, Walsall and Nottingham, and who was most recently Interim Chief of Surrey County Council, was in a similar take-no-prisoners mood.

“The old ways just aren't going to cut it anymore,” he said.

“We as a nation are in the tightest financial situation we've been in since the period 1976-80, after the IMF bailout,” he went on, citing Institute of Fiscal Studies data (www.ifs.org.uk) that predicts that the state is now entering the longest continuous period of public sector cutbacks since 1948.

If Labour or the Tories get in, he added, they will protect some core areas like the NHS and slash others.

The IFS suggests this will translate to reductions of 25% in both cases for the next five years as the government tries to reduce the national debt of some £890bn, equivalent to 62% of GDP.

“You need to prepare for this – just as you also need to stop thinking 2015 means any kind of resumption of 'normal service,'” he said. “In ten years China and India will be pushing the US into third place in the global economic order, we face huge issues around climate change and sustainability, there are challenges in terms of transport planning, waste and energy management – and we have a demographic time bomb where soon there will be more over 65s than there are under 16s, with all the implications for that on the job market and paying for the welfare state.”

In response, government will look to technology but HR and ICT leaders have never enjoyed the same status as those in local government “who control the cash and assets”. That has to change, he believes, to maximise the positive impact of information as a way to deal with all these grave issues.

The day ended on a positive note, with a vision of a Minister and CIO at the heart of the public sector determined to use technology to create a “reformed, collaborative and innovative” set of new services for the public that would offer real benefits.

But getting there may be a difficult and testing process, delegates were informed, with new Socitm president Jos Creese, head of IT at Hampshire County Council concluding, “We can no longer bask in the role of just being 'IT suppliers' to the organisation – we need to fundamentally shift how both technology and our role are perceived.”