35 MC/20/14 ICT STRATEGY PDF 644 KB
Cabinet Member for Customers, Digital Transformation & Improvement
Minutes:
35.1 The Chairman invited the Cabinet Member for Customers, Digital Transformation and Improvement to introduce Paper MC/20/14, which was for comment only.
35.2 Councillor Morley introduced the report and said that the focus of the ICT Strategy was to ensure that ICT could enable better outcomes for residents and businesses, and that staff can fulfil their roles effectively and efficiently. It sought to unlock value in the existing partnership with Suffolk County Council and existing software estate. She thanked the Council’s own ICT department, but also the ICT team at Suffolk County Council.
35.3 She invited Matthew Harding – Corporate Manager – ICT, to present a high-level summary of the ICT Strategy.
35.4 The Corporate Manager – ICT provided the presentation for the ICT Strategy.
Note: The meeting was adjourned between 6:13 pm to 6:23 pm.
Councillors Amorowson and Pratt left the meeting at 6:23 pm.
35.5 The Chairman invited Members to comment on the ICT Strategy and the presentation.
35.6 Councillor Passmore thought that in order to make access to Council’s service easier for residents, connectivity to broadband and 5G were important factors. It was also crucial that data was used as evidence for allocating resources and that the public was informed on how this data was used. He felt that the ability to link with the voluntary services was important and whether this could be facilitated by platforms such as Zoom. He added that the ICT Strategy should provide a better service to residents and partners in the community.
35.7 Councillor Ekpenyong felt that the exchange of ideas within the Council’s communities required good broadband connections, to enable local economy to grow and to alleviate isolation for residents.
35.8 Councillor Whitehead believed that people were in the centre of the ICT policy, but as the organisation moved to use ICT, more rigor had to be put in place.
35.9 Councillor Mansel commented that there was no mention of Members in the ICT Strategy, only customers and staff. She referred to the cloud-based solution on page 74 of the Strategy and was concerned for the cost and the security implications. She was also concerned whether the Council was looking at the carbon footprint for the data storage and services and if this complied with the Council’s pledge to be carbon neutral by the year 2030.
35.10 The Corporate Manager – ICT responded that the green cost was being reviewed and that a number of the Council’s vendors would be carbon neutral by the year 2030.
35.11 Councillor Geake thought that the use of the term customers in the document was inappropriate, as this indicated that they had choice for the services they wanted to access. She said that customers were not the same as residents, who were also citizens and asked that this was taken into consideration in the Council’s policies and strategies.
35.12 Councillor Field felt there was nothing controversial in the document, if people used modern applications and that the technology and equipment actually worked and was ... view the full minutes text for item 35
33 BC/20/14 ICT STRATEGY PDF 630 KB
Cabinet Member for Customers, Digital Transformation & Improvement
Minutes:
33.1 The Chair invited the Cabinet Member for Customers, Digital Transformation and Improvement to introduce Paper BC/20/14.
33.2 Councillor Parker introduced the report and summarised the main points in the report, including that an ICT Strategy was all about customer outcome and not IT delivery. He then introduced Matthew Harding, Corporate Manager for ICT who provided a presentation to Members before responding to Members’ questions.
33.3 Councillor Maybury hoped that when the new strategy had been implemented, the collating and use of data would be improved to ensure that deceased residents were not forwarded any communication.
33.4 The Corporate Manager responded that where access to data was possible, this would be improved. However, there were lags in the data available to the Council.
33.5 Councillor Jamieson enquired about the carbon footprint for the services included in the Strategy, such as storage and hardware.
33.6 The Corporate Manager for ICT responded that this information was not available yet, but that a process was being undertaken through the biodiversity and carbon reduction plans. Microsoft was trialling a tool set to monitor the carbon footprint for services.
33.7 Councillor Ward said that the strategy was easy to understand and he was pleased that the focus was data gathering and the analysis of the information available. He added that storage was efficient and shared facilities should be monitored to ensure efficiency.
33.8 Councillor Busby commented that that the Council had worked on getting the management of the data right for a number of years.
33.9 The Corporate Manger for ICT responded that the Cloud based service provided the Council with the power to process data quicker than before and that data could be joined up quicker, which had made a significant shift in the process.
33.10 Councillor McCraw thanked the Corporate Manager for ICT for the presentation which had made the technical issues easy to understand. He thought that it was important to take care when creating the processes and that to be successful, IT being intuitive had to be key. He felt that it was good that the Council was not subservient to Suffolk County Council and that the Council had its own ICT Strategy.
33.11 Councillor Parker agreed with Councillor McCraw and said that ultimately it was all about Customer Care and that customers could access the Council Services when they would like.
33.12 The Chair thanked Members and Officers.
The report was for comment only.