UK Gov IT chief backs open source, small business
The UK government’s deputy Chief Information Officer has outlined plans to hand public sector IT contracts over to small businesses and suppliers of open-source and cloud-based solutions in an attempt to balance the books.
Speaking at the 360IT conference in London on Wednesday, Bill McCluggage also promised greater transparency over IT procurement, with tenders and contracts published online.
"It is quite an interesting time, with some 120 days since the new government,” he told delegates. “The new administration's policy is to promote small business procurement so that 25 per cent of government contracts should be awarded to SMEs.”
"We want to move away from large system integrators," he added.
McCluggage said IT projects across all departments were being reassessed ion a bid to cut the bill for central government IT, which currently stands at more than £7 billion – nearly half of the £16.9 billion spent nationally on public sector IT services.
