To consider the report.

The Chairman informed that he had asked for this to come to Panel as there had been a long journey since the ICT Strategy had been adopted, we had new Members and we did  not have in any one place the journey the authority had undertaken; it was often forgotten where we started from to where we are today. 

There had been a lot of successes behind us and it was a good time to review the journey.  RBWM started with a strategy document in 2010; that was not very good and thus was updated in 2012. Rocco Labellarte  joined the authority and took on this challenge.

Rocco Labellarte informed that the report before the Panel gave an indication of the journey they had been on with regards to implementing the ICT strategy and its subsequent updates.  There had been a lack of investment in ICT so the strategy was starting from a low base, however in 2012 there was a shift from traditional working methods towards investment into ‘the cloud’ and the smarter working project.  The report showed 17 key achievements and if you looked back to 2012 this showed the challenges faced by the authority; it was a useful reflection of what we didn’t have at that time.

Today we have a new website, joined up procurement and asset management, remote working was now embedded as was the use of Wi-Fi and mobile technology.  We now have a reasonable decent infrastructure with better enablement of technology.  A better resilient and defended environment had been introduced with frequent security checks showing year on year improvements.   The authority was now about two thirds along the journey.   We have moved form a capital intensive strategy to a hosted basis and the vast majority of business applications were now up to date.

Moving forward the authority was working towards a digital 24/7 council with the new website being refined. The introduction of a ‘residents account’ would form the foundation of bringing together services for residents and businesses as part of the digital transformation of our offer.

Cllr Jones asked if wireless networking was going to be introduced to York House, Windsor, and was informed that yes York House would be wireless enabled.  With regards to a question about how the ‘Paris’ system was utilised differently by Adult Services and Children’s service the panel were informed that Paris was one of the case management systems that the authority used that needed rationalisation.  There was a general consensus that we need to move away from Paris to another solution, it was a complex move that would take at least two to three years to achieve the business and efficiency needs.

Cllr Rankin questioned the current position of the CRM replacement system and was informed that the aim was to have a single contact point for the resident that then went through the system to follow the journey of the contact.  There had been one procurement process that hadn’t delivered a workable solution so they were investigating a digital system; the current system was hindered by the need for 3rd party development driving up the price.  

The Chairman informed that the original project had been halted because it was not the right solution at the right cost.  The aim was to have residents telling us once and nether again, we should have one view across the council in real time and it should aid work flow distributing information to the right points.   We were looking for better working methods.

The Chairman asked for an update on the town centre Wi-Fi project.  The Panel were informed that this was not in the original strategy but as the opportunity arose to give residents free Wi-Fi in town centres; especially Windsor that had high footfall, the project was added to the work flow.  The authority went to market and had 20 expressions of interests, however when they found out they had to do it for free this reduced to one expression of interest.  The contract was agreed and awarded however in the end it was not fulfilled as the company wrongly thought they would also be including Ascot Racecourse and without this the finances did not add up.  Other options were currently being explored at zero cost or adding onto another project at low cost.

Cllr Wilson asked if the community wardens were to be provided with tablets to aid them in their work and was informed that this went back to the earlier CRM discussion in enabling a single point of contact for residents.  ICT were working with their internal customer to see what their requirements were and how best to meet them.

Cllr Wilson also questioned the safety of our residents’ data and asked for reassurance.  The panel were informed that every year the council was compliance tested and that the standards were becoming every increasingly more robust; the goal posts were constantly moving and because of this compliance was increasingly becoming more difficult to achieve.  The Panel were informed that just over two years ago the Council’s penetration test allowed access to our core data within about 11 seconds; corrective measures had improved this to over 4 hours.   The Council’s firewalls had also just been updated and all mobile devises were encrypted.

Cllr Smith questioned the very specific savings targets in the strategy and how on the revenue side this was £900k.  The Panel were informed that all targets had not been met but they had reduce capital spend by £500k per year and with regards to revenue they were due to go to the Employment Panel to propose £259k of savings.  There were also additional proposals as part of the Council’s restructure.   These would relate to £500k savings from staff costs. The delay into moving to the cloud had also delayed saving proposals.

Cllr Smith also mentioned that due to the work undertaken it was time to refresh the ICT Strategy and the Chairman agreed that the journey had been moved on since Rocco had been recruited and that it was time to see the strategy being updated.

The Chairman mentioned it was important to note that security was now cabinet compliant and that the vision of projects had vastly improved with visibility of all projects now available.  The decluttering of project management and enabling of technology was part of the new journey.   It was also recommended that a post implementation review of the ICT strategy be undertaken to show what we had achieved and if we did not achieve why not.  It was agreed to circulate the summary document to all members. 

RESOLVED UNANIMOUSLY: That the Panel note the update.