UK e-envoy dubs government IT 'a disaster'

UK e-envoy Alex Allan has admitted that the government's IT systems are in chaos.

During an exclusive interview with Silicon.com, Allan discussed the challenges he is preparing to face with the UK government's private and public sector ecommerce policy.

The role includes negotiating between industry and government over the level of regulation surrounding the Net and ecommerce. He will also be partly responsible - along with Ian McCartney, e-government minister, and Patricia Hewitt, DTI e-minister - for overseeing the mammoth task of modernising Britain's public services.

Given the current state of play he admitted the job will be not be easy. "We are looking hard at the high profile disasters and trying to take forward the lessons we've learned from them. The message is not to give up but to move forward intelligently," he said.

Allan said his former experience as an IT consultant and later as a civil servant in various government departments, will be instrumental to his success. He said he has spent the last few months striving to catch up with current ecommerce developments, given his absence from the country since 1997.

Ecommerce consultancy Relativity's European VP, David Green, said Allan will have to remain pragmatic throughout his mission to modernise government.

"Tony Blair's e-government targets are ambitious but achievable. The only way they're going to be able to achieve them is to use the systems they already have pragmatically. If Allan aims too high, he will fail," he said.

Green added that Allan's main role in promoting the development of ecommerce in the UK will be maintaining public and business confidence in ecommerce when things go wrong and enthusiasm wanes.