Transformation talk is ‘drivel’

Madam, – It is no surprise Scottish Government IT is a mess.

I attended the 2016 annual conference of the IT trade body Scotland IS.

Keynote speakers were Mike Russell, whose theme was how bad Brexit was, and Derek McKay, whose remit includes IT, who tried to ingratiate himself with the audience of techies by reminiscing about the Sinclair ZX80 of his childhood.

There was no mention of the unfolding police, NHS 24, farm payments or pensions fiascos.

The idea of streamlined government services underpinned by shared data, processes and best practice or words such as on time, on budget, or adherence to standards, were also ignored concepts.

These people live in a world of undelivered broadband promises, namedropping terms such as Internet of Things, celebration of innovations more at home in a Men’s Shed computer club and woolly initiatives best captured in the introduction to their 2017 Digital Strategy, whose myriad objectives include seeing Scotland “ranked in the first quartile of countries in the world on productivity, wellbeing, equality and sustainability.

“It is therefore critical that Scotland is at the forefront of the global digital economy.” What drivel. While there are notable exceptions to this, the sad fact is we lack hard-nosed leadership at the top, a huge reluctance to engage and change in the middle, and not a single Scottish-owned company is big enough to specify, develop, deliver and manage these lucrative projects which, if well designed and executed, could transform the delivery and cost of public services and provide the core domestic market on which to build a global industry in the same way as we dominated shipbuilding.

Never mind, we’ve always got the booming renewables industry to fall back on.

Allan Sutherland. 1 Willow Row, Stonehaven.