Birmingham council employees want faster access to applications

Council employees want faster speed of access to applications more than training or mobile working, according to a survey of employees at the UK’s largest local authority.

Some 3,110 employees of Birmingham City Council were surveyed by Capita to find out what would be the most popular improvements to IT.

Capita has set up a joint venture company with the council called Service Birmingham, which has been awarded a 10-year contract worth a minimum of £475m to supply ICT services.

Some 36% of employees wanted faster access to applications, compared with 13% who prioritised training and the same proportion that wanted mobile working.

Service Birmingham has started work on a new network with speeds of 10Mbytes. The network will connect 150 corporate sites, 430 schools and 50 libraries.

Birmingham’s assistant to the chief executive on transformation, Glyn Evans, said, “This survey improves our understanding of the council’s wants and needs to help improve its day-to-day working. The results will be used by Service Birmingham to continue to improve the services it provides.”

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