To print: Click here or Select File and then Print from your browser's menu

This story was printed from silicon.com, located at http://www.silicon.com/

Story URL: http://management.silicon.com/government/0,39024677,39129744,00.htm

Election 2005: Next government must launch 'war on hackers'
Better e-gov and more broadband also high on the to-do list, says industry

By Steve Ranger

Published: Thursday 21 April 2005

A war on hackers, more investment in technology and a greater effort to bridge the digital divide should all be on the next government's to-do list, according to IT industry leaders.

David Roberts, chief executive of the Corporate IT Forum Tif, said that IT security has to be a key concern for any new government.

"IT security is a fairly significant issue – one of the things that IT is very good at is ignoring national boundaries. We need to have a war against the hackers and some strong legislation – the scope for IT fraud is already significant and increasing," he said.

Roberts said it would also be useful for government to promote its own successes with putting services online to encourage "even small companies" to get e-enabled.

Dr Jeremy Beale, head of the e-business group at the CBI, also said that information security should be higher up the political agenda.

And he said the future government could also do more to make broadband services useful to business. "Much of the push has been aimed at consumers, it hasn't been about what businesses can do with this technology and we think that's a great opportunity," he said.

Making public services more accessible – while making sure that parts of the community aren't excluded by the move to new technology – was also a common desire voiced by industry leaders.

Kate Mountain, chief executive of local government IT user group Socitm, said the new government should make sure more people have access to IT. "If we are going to decrease the digital divide and encourage more people to use government services online, we must make sure we don't exclude anyone," she said.

She also said that the new government should "encourage investment in IT across the public sector and the business community", and said this would mean some sort of additional incentive – such as tax breaks for new investment.

Think tank The Work Foundation agreed the next government should do more to improve communication about new services.

"The move to put services online is an important one and one that the government should pursue," Alexandra Jones, senior researcher at The Work Foundation, told silicon.com.

"A lot of people find information quite hard to find – we need much better communication about how people can access services online," she added.

She said that making broadband widely available is another area to focus on: "It will be an issue in rural areas and one that the government will have to think about. They need to make sure there aren't people that are excluded from government services and other parts of society."

Meanwhile, the Professional Contractors Group continues to call for the abolition of IR35 legislation and wants continued restrictions on work permits for workers in sectors where the UK already possesses an adequate skills base – such as IT consultants. It also wants to see more promotion of UK businesses in the face of cheaper competition offshore, and wants to see more access to government procurement by smaller businesses.

"PCG believes it is now time for the onerous criteria that prevent smaller firms from competing for government work to be removed and for a central portal providing details of how to tender for all government contracts to be created," it said.

But whatever the details, any new government that ignores IT puts at risk the economic growth of the country, warned IT supplier association Intellect.

John Higgins, Intellect director general, said that while political parties will be promising an expanding economy, increased jobs and financial security, no government can deliver on this without understanding the key role that technology will play.

"Intellect considers this to be a simple equation, no exploitation of technology equals no knowledge economy equals no economic growth," he said.

"Should the next government fail to place the knowledge economy and technology jointly at the heart its economic vision, the cost to the UK and its citizens will be huge."

Higgins said that as the UK's economic prosperity is at the core of the general election campaign "now is the time for us to ask whether politicians get IT. If they don't, then serious questions need to be asked about their ability to deliver on the promises they are making."