Local authorities will spend £3.3bn on IT in this
financial year and will have to continue to invest heavily if they
are to complete the business transformation projects that have been
demanded by central government, according to a survey by local
authority IT managers group Socitm.
The projects are required if local government is to deliver cost
savings and drive up the use of e-government channels, ministers
said earlier this year.
Although councils' spending on IT is set to be 23% higher in
2005-2006 than in 2004-2005, local government is spending less on
IT than organisations from other sectors that are undertaking
business transformation projects.
John Serle, editor of Socitm's IT Trends report, said, "Councils
are spending 2% to 4% of their revenue while the financial sector,
for example, is spending 4% to 8%. If the new agenda is
transformational, considerably higher levels of investment are
going to be needed."
Socitm compared spending by local authorities with estimates
from analyst firm Gartner of the average spending in other
sectors.
Although councils are working on IT-driven projects to cut
costs, the survey found no evidence of councils working on
large-scale business transformation projects.
Serle said, "Things like hot-desking and not having people work
from a central location are not in the consciousness of local
authority people yet.
"One of the reasons is politics and the other reason is courage.
There is a high possibility that things will go wrong with business
transformation projects."
The technology landscape of local authorities is changing, the
survey found. The PC remains the dominant technology used by UK
councils, which plan to buy about 250,000 units this year. Dell has
continued to increase its market share at the expense of its
competitors.
Replacement cycles for all technology continue to lengthen. PCs
and portables now have an average life expectancy of almost four
years and servers four-and-a-half years, according to Socitm.
Councils appear to make little use of wireless technology either
within their buildings or across the council area. "Considering the
growth in PDAs and other mobile technology this is surprising," the
survey said.
Microsoft's SQL database continues to grow in popularity and use
of Oracle products is expected to increase.
Legacy mainframe systems also continue to disappear from
councils. Use of Solaris appears to be in decline after a period of
steady growth. But use of Linux is forecast to grow, and Windows
2003 Server is an emerging technology in local authorities, the
survey revealed.