PublicTechnology.net

Government plans to bring in expand specialist digital recruitment capabilities at the Government Digital Service and “address reward issues” in digital, data and technology have been revealed in a job advert for a new director for the function.

The government’s industrial strategy has emphasised the importance of data-sharing by Whitehall, as well as a push to improve digital skills training and boost funding for technologies like robotics and 5G.

MPs have called on the Home Office to step up its contingency planning in case a new emergency communications system for the police, fire and ambulance services is not ready in time for its planned December 2019 switch-on.

The Department for Work and Pensions has launched the hunt for a supplier to handle its document management services.

Suppliers of cloud-based technology to government will be able to apply for the ninth iteration of the G-Cloud framework from March, the government has announced.

The government is to examine how it plans to maintain the UK’s digital economy after Brexit, it has announced.

IT failures and an inability to cope with the volume of calls led to the early termination of an Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs contract with supplier Concentrix, according to a spending watchdog.

The government’s timeline for implementing plans to digitise record keeping and reporting of tax is “wholly unrealistic” and should be delayed until at least 2019-20, the House of Commons Treasury Committee has said.

Governments need to stop relying on outsourcing and make sure they have competent public servants who can deal with technology, the former leader of the Australia’s Digital Transformation Office has said.

Civica is large enough to take on big transformation government projects but small enough to be seen as “part of the team”, chief executive Wayne Story has said at the launch of its dedicated digital division.

Government digital teams need to make more use of technical writers to help technology teams and allow others to concentrate on transformation, a Government Digital Service staffer has said.

The prime minister Theresa May has announced plans to improve online advice and information on mental health and increase the use of digitally assisted therapies.

A former NHS IT director at a Surrey NHS trust who accepted bribes in exchange for the award of IT contracts has been jailed for three and a half years.

A third of UK council websites have not passed the first stage of Socitm’s annual test to assess their accessibility to people with disabilities.

The Government Digital Service has upgraded the public Application Programming Interface for GOV.UK Notify based on the results of user research carried out during its private beta.

The cross-government network for civil servants specialising in procurement is recruiting for a number of senior digital and technology roles for people, including the position of commercial director of IT for HMRC.

The association of IT and digital professionals in local government has announced its plans for 2017 research and policy projects.

As the New Year approaches, PublicTechnology takes a look at what we might expect in the world of digital government in 2017. 

The Home Office service design team is building a common language help different teams in the department communicate more simply and clearly.

The Home Office has created a deputy director position on its live services team to manage a new strategic service desk and develop a cyber security operations centre.

Local government is struggling to make the best use of citizen data due to incompatible technology infrastructure, lack of budget and siloed data sources, according to a report.