Asked by: Norman Lamb (Liberal Democrat - North Norfolk)
Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, who is responsible for digitisation in his Department; and what mechanisms the person with responsibility for digitisation uses to champion digitisation.
Answered by Christopher Pincher
GDS leads the Government's Digital, Data and Technology (DDaT) function, helping departments build and run services that are digital by default and focused on the needs of citizens.
The FCO makes use of digital, data and technology across its operations and diplomatic work. Examples include a small Digital Transformation Unit, which works with our consular technology teams on the delivery of modern, accessible online consular services, fulfilling the government's 'digital by default' commitment. The Department also has an Archives Management Team within the Knowledge and Technology Directorate who are responsible for the digitisation of public records in line with The National Archives' (TNA) requirements; and an Open Source Unit which leads on using open source data in policy making. To aid internal behavioural change, we established a Work Smarter campaign in January 2018, aimed at helping staff get the most out of digital technology, and we are working to set up the Digital Data and Technology Profession. A member of the FCO Board acts as the Champion for improving our release and use of data in all aspects of our work.
Asked by: Norman Lamb (Liberal Democrat - North Norfolk)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what progress has been made on (a) the NHS Long Term Plan commitment to ensure that 100 per cent of children and young people who need specialist mental health care can access it and (b) ensuring that 100 per cent of children aged 2 and under can access that care.
Answered by Nadine Dorries
It has not proved possible to respond to the hon. Member in the time available before Dissolution.
Asked by: Norman Lamb (Liberal Democrat - North Norfolk)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps the Government is taking to fulfill its commitment in its Prevention Green Paper to seek views on how to improve the healthy social and emotional development of babies and young children.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Government is taking steps to fulfil its commitment in its Prevention Green Paper to seek views on how to improve the healthy social and emotional development of babies and young children.
Public Health England’s (PHE’s) vision is to improve the health of babies, children and their families and to enable the foundations of good health into adulthood. A large proportion of this work will be done through the modernisation of the Healthy Child Programme, which is PHE’s national offer to our children and families. This can be viewed at the following links:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/healthy-child-programme-5-to-19-years-old
Asked by: Norman Lamb (Liberal Democrat - North Norfolk)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what plans he is putting in place to support and monitor the delivery of the revised Healthy Child programme.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
It has not proved possible to respond to the hon. Member in the time available before Dissolution.
Asked by: Norman Lamb (Liberal Democrat - North Norfolk)
Question to the Department for International Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for International Trade, who is responsible for digitisation in her Department; and what mechanisms the person with responsibility for digitisation uses to champion digitisation.
Answered by Conor Burns
Holly Ellis, Director of Digital, Data and Technology (DDaT), alongside Departmental Directors and DGs, is responsible for ‘digitisation’
Digitisation, and maturing our current digital services and approach, is championed through a variety of means, including:
- Demonstrating benefits to colleagues across the Department, so they understand the productivity gains, increased customer satisfaction and reach.
- Delivery of training and communication to build capability, helping employees understand possibilities and how to engage on DDaT projects.
- DDaT and other function joint boards for cross-departmental buy-in and delivery of digitisation projects.
- The DIT DDaT strategy has been approved by the Executive Committee.
Asked by: Norman Lamb (Liberal Democrat - North Norfolk)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, who is responsible for digitisation in his Department; and what mechanisms the person with responsibility for digitisation uses to champion digitisation.
Answered by Chris Skidmore
The Chief Digital Officer (CDO), Emma Stace, is responsible for leading Digital Delivery across the Department for Education (DfE).
The DfE Transformation Aims involve promoting user-centred, end-to-end service design and delivery across the whole department.
The CDO and policy directors have jointly sponsored scoping work to identify opportunities for the development of digital services to deliver better outcomes for our users and continue the transformation of DfE into a service delivery department.
The Digital, Data and Technology (DDT) Directorates within DfE are supporting the government-wide focus on the development of “digital maturity”, developing the department’s processes, tools, infrastructure and capabilities. In support of this, the CDO is promoting the development of the community of service owners, sharing experience and best practice and identifying how the DfE can continue to develop to better support the development and delivery of digital services. This includes work to grow and develop DDT capability across the department, including through improving recruitment, training and procurement.
The DfE works with the Government Digital Service to provide assurance against the Government Service Standards, to ensure that the services being delivered are high quality, user centred, and delivering value to users.
Asked by: Norman Lamb (Liberal Democrat - North Norfolk)
Question to the Scotland Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland, who is responsible for digitisation in his Department; and what mechanisms the person with responsibility for digitisation uses to champion digitisation.
Answered by Alister Jack - Secretary of State for Scotland
The Office does not have a dedicated member of staff wholly responsible for digitisation. The Office works closely with the Government Digital Service (GDS) to make a wide range of digital information available to the public through gov.uk and the www.deliveringforscotland.gov.uk microsite also provides clear digital routes to many key public services provided by the Government.
Asked by: Norman Lamb (Liberal Democrat - North Norfolk)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who is responsible for digitisation in his Department; and what mechanisms the person with responsibility for digitisation uses to champion digitisation.
Answered by Simon Clarke
HM Treasury does not provide digital services to citizens, outside of information published to www.gov.uk. In this, we are fully engaged with the work of GDS in its continuing transformation to “digital by default”. The Head of Digital Communications in the Communications team is responsible for maintaining and cultivating the relationship with GDS.
Asked by: Norman Lamb (Liberal Democrat - North Norfolk)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, who is responsible for digitisation in his Department; and what mechanisms the person with responsibility for digitisation uses to champion digitisation.
Answered by Jake Berry
GDS leads the digital function across government. Each Department has individuals responsible for leading digital in their respective Departments.
In MHCLG the Chief Digital Officer is Paul Maltby.
The mechanisms used to develop digital maturity are as follows:
We have a controls process in place to adhere to GDS and Cabinet Office standards.
We procure or build office IT and digital services.
We offer a User Centred Design team to design digital products and processes for the department.
We have teams working jointly with policy officials and local government to build digital maturity and the digital transformation of land planning and housing sectors
We hold regular digital showcases and show and tell events attended by a large cross section of the department to help build digital capability and awareness.
Asked by: Norman Lamb (Liberal Democrat - North Norfolk)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, who is responsible for digitisation in her Department; and what mechanisms the person with responsibility for digitisation uses to champion digitisation.
Answered by Nadhim Zahawi
The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) and its partner organisations have digital strategies exploring opportunities to transform services using modern technologies and aligning with the objectives in the Single Departmental Plan and the Secretary of State’s agreed priorities.
We make use of agile project management methodologies and work closely with our colleagues at the Government Digital Service to ensure we are using best practice service design techniques, creating the digital services that citizens and businesses need the most.
The core Department takes a blended approach to resourcing digital projects with work performed by in-house teams, externally-sourced teams or a combination of these depending on the skills required for a given project.