Digital Government

Peter Kyle Excerpts

Tuesday 21st January 2025 Written Statements

[The Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology (Peter Kyle)]

I am pleased to present the “State of Digital Government Review” and “Blueprint for Modern Digital Government” to Parliament.

We have already shown how technologies like artificial intelligence can drive economic growth, create new jobs and improve living standards. We have announced AI-powered tools that will make the state more productive, too. Now, we are setting out how we will use technology to empower citizens and transform their experience of the state and the services it provides.

In the last two decades, the digital revolution has changed the world. Commerce, banking and travel are easier and more convenient than ever before. However, the state has been allowed to fall behind.

The “State of Digital Government Review” shows just how wide the gap between the state and the private sector has become. A comprehensive evaluation of the United Kingdom’s public sector digital infrastructure and capabilities, it shows that successes are too often achieved despite the system: they rely on the dedication of experts doing their best with limited resources, navigating processes which were not designed for a digital age, and implementing policies which were not designed to be digital first. As well as finding that our current paradigm of digital transformation is not working, it reveals a fragmented technology landscape that is dependent on ageing legacy systems and exposed to cyber-attacks and technology failure; where data is siloed; and which does not have enough skilled people to sustain and transform it.

The statistics are shocking. Failure to adopt new technology costs the taxpayer £45 billion a year. Some 47% of central Government services still rely on non-digital methods like phone calls or paper forms, and the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency alone processes 45,000 letters every day. Over half of government’s tech budget goes to external consultants, short-term contractors and managed services providers.

It is working people who are paying the price. To manage a long-term disability in Britain today, you have to engage with more than 40 different services across nine organisations. A recent cyber-attack on NHS provider Synnovis led to over 10,000 appointments being postponed—heartbreaking news for patients who had already waited months, sometimes years, to be seen.

As progress has stalled, satisfaction has declined. There has been an 11% fall in satisfaction with Government digital services in the last decade. We need a co-ordinated, strategic vision for modern digital Government more than ever. That is what the “Blueprint for Modern Digital Government” provides. It sets out our vision for putting the state at citizens’ fingertips, with public services that fit around the lives of the people who use them. To deliver that vision, it sets out a six-point plan:

We will join up public sector digital services, acting as one public sector to enable next-generation public services, better supporting businesses, and ensuring that services are consistently high-standard.

We will harness the power of AI for the public good, establishing an AI adoption unit to build and deploy AI into public services, growing AI capacity and capability across Government, and building trust, responsibility and accountability into all we do.

We will strengthen and extend our digital and data public infrastructure, expanding gov.uk One Login and other common components, enabling access to data through the national data library, strengthening cyber and technical resilience and building more responsibly.

To make this happen, we need to elevate digital leadership to the centre of public sector decision-making, invest in the digital and data profession to compete for talent, and raise the digital skills baseline for all public servants.

And there are some hard changes to make to how we deliver in government. We need to reform the Government’s approach to funding digital and technology, and maximise the value and potential of public procurement.

As we do this, we will be open with this House and the public, publishing and acting on performance data, and doing more of the work of Government in the open, so that people can help shape changes that affect them.

The blueprint will transform how citizens experience the state, empowering them to engage with digital public services when, how, and where they choose. It also sets out how we will use technology to drive radical, far-reaching reform across the public sector.

Delivery of the blueprint will be led by the new digital centre of Government within my Department. This new team has now been established, bringing together the work of the previous Government Digital Service, the Centre Digital and Data Office, and the incubator for AI from the Cabinet Office, as well as the Geospatial Commission and part of the responsible technology adoption unit from other parts of my Department. This new integrated function will be referred to as the Government Digital Service.

[HCWS375]