A new study shows that central government organisations are generally positive about the capabilities of their IT.
Benchmarking the Back Office: Central Government, published by the Cabinet Office along with the Putting the Frontline First strategy document, shows that on a scale up to 5.0 most organisations rate their IT capability at over 3.5. The average rating is 3.8.
Among the highest scorers of the 174 bodies covered by the survey are the Northern Ireland Office, the Pensions Regulator and the British Museum with 4.5, and the Department for Children, Schools and Families, the National Gallery and regional development agency One North East with 4.4.
At the bottom end of the scale the National Policing Improvement Agency, which is pushing for a more streamlined procurement and implementation of IT among the UK's police forces, scores just 2.2.
The figures have been self-assessed by organisations using aggregates of survey responses from board, management and front-line staff on whether they were confident that the IT available would fulfil their business needs. The report qualifies the finding by pointing out there are no external references, but says overall boards are generally content with the service they are receiving.
The study also records that the amount spent on IT as a proportion of operational costs averages 6.1 percent, although there are some wide variations. For a number of organisations the figure is less than one percent, while there are also high scorers such as HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) and the Child Maintenance and Enforcement Commission, both with 22.8 percent, and the Student Loans Company with 22.7 percent.
It qualifies the figures by pointing out that capital expenditure is included in the relevant cost for IT but not in the overall operations figure, and says this has inflated the figures for HMRC and the Ministry of Defence.
"The cost of IT services across central government is broadly within the range expected and this is encouraging, although clearly some departments have work to do to re-engineer their IT, reduce their run and maintain costs whilst still delivering against the requirements of their department," the study says.
It adds that government is not fully exploiting economies of scale in IT services, and the data hides a plethora of duplication of systems, services and infrastructure.
