Government call centre proposal slammed as unworkable

A government proposal to consolidate public sector call centres will turn council leaders off the idea of shared services, public sector IT managers have warned.

The proposal, which was part of last December’s pre-Budget statement, was this week rejected as unworkable by the Society of IT Management (Socitm).

The trade body was reacting to a Treasury-commissioned report into how the public sector should share more services. The report was written by the former chairman of HM Revenue & Customs, David Varney.

In its official reaction to the Varney report, Socitm said, “Calls for the rationalising of sub-200-seat call centres may be appropriate for central government, but are probably not for local government.

“This sort of ambiguity causes uncertainty about the report’s recommendations and may provide an excuse for some people in local government not to engage with the report’s findings and recommendations.”

Socitm also rejected Varney’s proposal to consolidate the number of local government websites.

Socitm reaction

Council staff resistant to large-scale change

The Varney report

Comment on this article: computer.weekly@rbi.co.uk