Auditel Consultant:
Lee Freeman

The time for cuts – the UK post Prudence

08 Jul 2010 | Filed under: cost management, government, iPhone, technology, The Budget

It seems that the messages delivered by George Osborne in his Budget recently are winning approval from elsewhere around the globe, well apparently the EU have giving the actions announced the thumbs up. I am sure we will all sleep a lot more soundly at night knowing that. However as you will know from some of my previous entries I have certain concerns, not that the cuts announced aren’t achievable, I am sure they are, but that the people tasked with delivering them, i.e. the public sector, have no track record of ever delivering.

There were a number of articles this week in the media that caught my eye concerning the cost of various websites that the public sector have developed, and which I think provides good cause for my concerns.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/rorycellanjones/2010/07/the_105m_website.html

The worrying thing for me is not necessarily that the site in question cost £105m to build and run for three years, but that nobody previously thought to question whether that was value for money or not before now. It is this culture that worries me when we are trying to find £120bn of cuts over the next 5 years.

It also seems that Whitehall has got in on the iPhone as well and have been busy developing apps.

http://www.mbmagazine.co.uk/RSS_News_Articles.cfm?NewsID=11349

Again it is the lack of a coherent strategy that is concerning me here, and a view shared by the consultant interviewed for the article. Just because the iPhone is the latest gizmo, does it mean government departments should be spending taxpayers’ money is developing very specific apps for it. Surely there are more cost efficient ways of getting their message across.

However not all is doom and gloom and I must take my hat off to the police service who have targeted £200m in IT savings alone over the coming 5 years.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/07/05/npia_savings_plan

Ok not actually the police force themselves but the National Policing Improvement Agency. One can only hope that more central agencies take note of these savings and follow suit.

One very interesting comment was made in the article concerning police forces sharing back office functions such as finance departments etc. I am sure there are huge savings to be made in simple areas like these, and not just in the police force either, the problem being is that they will probably need to employ a very expensive consulting firm to tell them how to do it. Well I can tell you for a fact that there are a huge number of people in the commercial world who have already turned this pipe dream into reality. Maybe it is time for a new form of National Service, rather than being called up to the armed forces you can be called up for a period of two years to the “Austerity task force”, providing you have the right background and experience. A damned sight cheaper than calling in that expensive management consulting firm.

Industry Tags: apps, cost cutting, iPhone, websites