Source · Select Committees · Public Accounts Committee
Recommendation 6
6
Accepted
Report to Parliament every six months on departmental digital Roadmap progress.
Recommendation
We are unconvinced that departments will be able to maintain commitment to the agreed Roadmap activities in the face of competing pressures and priorities. Departments must buy in to the long-term advantages of following the digital change agenda. CDDO can monitor progress from the centre, but departments must continue to play their part in completing the agreed activities in the Roadmap. Lack of sustained leadership engagement is a risk to delivery that needs to be taken seriously and CDDO must continue to push for priority with senior leaders. We agree that overall pressures on spending in the current climate require better delivery for improved efficiency at lower cost. Competing pressures and changing priorities will present challenges to the delivery of the Roadmap despite CDDO’s best endeavours. 8 Digital transformation in government: addressing the barriers to efficiency Effective and timely reporting is necessary to hold departments accountable for completion of the agreed Roadmap activities, and CDDO must ensure it maintains suitable levers to keep progress from stalling. Recommendation 6: CDDO should report to Parliament in six months’ time, and 6-monthly thereafter, on each department’s progress towards achieving the Roadmap commitments they have agreed to. We note that the first 6 monthly report has been published. Digital transformation in government: addressing the barriers to efficiency 9 1 Leadership, skills and capacity
Government Response Summary
The government accepted the recommendation, agreeing that CDDO will report to Parliament every six months on departmental progress against Roadmap commitments, in addition to updating the Digital and Data Board and publishing a public update, with a target implementation date of February 2024.
Government Response
Accepted
HM Government
Accepted
The government agrees with the Committee’s recommendation. Board’ on departmental and overall progress against the Roadmap every six months, as well as publishing a public update. CDDO will ensure that Parliament also receives this update, with departmental progress included. Some Roadmap commitments are joint goals and will be reported on as a collective. For example, commitment 3 states that all departments will work to make all ‘essential shared’ data assets available and in use across government through trusted application programming interfaces (APIs) and platforms such as Government Data Exchange (GDX) and the Integrated Data Service (IDS), along with commitment 22 stating CDDO and HM Treasury will work together to develop and trial new approaches to financial processes, business case and impact tracking challenges, and pilot with four departments ahead of any potential wider rollout.