Conservative leader
David
Cameron has outlined his party's IT strategy for government
saying there would be a "level playing field for open source
software in IT procurement" and no room for projects like the
"hubristic
NHS supercomputer".
He also proposes "spending transparency" in which "every public
body must publish every item of Government expenditure over
£25,000, increasing accountability to the taxpayer".
It is unclear, however, how this would be achieved in practice
or how much detail would be required on spending over £25,000.
Cameron's speech "Innovation must be at the heart of public
policy" was at the National
Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts.
He said, "We will follow private sector best practice which is
to introduce 'open standards' that enables IT contracts to be split
up into modular components. So never again could there be projects
like Labour's hubristic NHS supercomputer. And we will create a
level playing field for open source software in IT procurement and
open up the procurement system to small and innovative
companies."
He added, "We're going to move from a top-down system to a
bottom-up one, where money follows the needs and wishes of
individuals and the users of services - not the priorities of the
bureaucracy."
He said open source methods "can help overcome the massive
problems in government IT programmes" adding, "The basic reason for
these problems is Labour's addiction to the mainframe model -
large, centralised systems for the management of information.
"From the NHS computer to the new
Child
Support Agency, they rely on 'closed' IT systems that reduce
competitive pressures and lead to higher risks and higher costs. A
Conservative government will take a different approach. We will
follow private sector best practice which is to introduce 'open
standards' that enables IT contracts to be split up into modular
components."
He added that the use of open source software through IT
procurement could result in "savings to the taxpayer of hundreds of
millions of pounds per year". It's unclear, however, whether EC
procurement rules would allow open source software to be specified
in tenders.
Cameron said, "Linux, the
open source pioneer, is now the fastest growing operating system in
the world, and even IBM is basing their new hardware on it.
Information liberation could be hugely beneficial in the new
economy.
"After all, what are the great new giants of the internet - from
Myspace to
eBay - but information processing
systems? These companies have grown because people rely on them to
transmit information quickly, easily, cheaply and securely. Imagine
if the information that government controlled was available to the
public too?"
His proposals include standardising local government
information, so it can be "collected and used by the public and
third party groups" to "create innovative applications and public
services" and crime mapping, so the "public can see a constantly
updating picture of crime in their area, increasing the
accountability of local police and politicians".
And instead of asking where the voluntary sector fits in,
Cameron's party would ask where it doesn't fit in. The
Conservatives would "concentrate on the results that public
services deliver, not prescribe the processes they have to
follow".
>>
IT pro report on Cameron's speech
>>
The speech in full
>>
Tony Collins' IT Projects Blog