The government has launched a task force to aggregate public sector
broadband demand in a bid to make it cost effective for telecoms
suppliers to widen the high-speed Internet infrastructure.
The team from the Treasury's Office of Government Commerce (OGC)
will meet with public sector buyers, ranging from councils and
schools to the NHS and emergency services over the next month to
evaluate procurement options.
It will also meet potential broadband suppliers over the next six
weeks to thrash out delivery mechanisms.
In addition, the task force will work with Government departments
defining their need for broadband services, by analysing the impact
of different procurement models, and their likely impact on the
availability of broadband.
Speaking at the Europe21 conference in London, E-commerce Minister
Douglas Alexander said: "The OGC's broadband procurement team will
play an integral part in making our vision for Broadband Britain a
reality."
The public sector spends an estimated £1.7bn in IT and
communications technology each year. "As a high spending
organisation, the Government wields enormous purchasing power,"
said Alexander
The e-Envoy's department will buttress the OGC by helping
government departments evaluate their demand for broadband services
and by analysing the impact of different procurement models on
competition, and their likely impact on the availability of
broadband.
The prime minister, Tony Blair, first announced the OGC's broadband
initiative last November.
However, e-envoy Andrew Pinder first proposed the idea of the
public sector aggregating its broadband demand in January
2001.
Pinder argued forcefully that the strategy could allow the public
sector to improve services and reduce costs. He also believed that
it could act as a catalyst to get telecom providers to roll out the
technology to parts of the country that would otherwise be
"bandwidth-challenged".