We won’t be held hostage by big tech: Shorten
Bill Shorten says government must stand up to big technology firms and consultants to ensure services benefit citizens, are delivered ethically, and costly failures are avoided.
The government services minister on Tuesday revealed he had nixed the Morrison government’s in-development welfare entitlement calculator – writing off $191 million in sunk costs – and warned vendors there had been a change in approach to technology spending and outsourcing.
Minister for Government Services Bill Shorten delivers a keynote at The Australian Financial Review Government Services Summit. Martin Ollman
Built by Infosys, which beat IBM and Accenture for the job, the so-called entitlement calculator engine was supposed to check eligibility for welfare recipients and how much to pay, and was expected to handle half of Centrelink’s payments by mid-2022.
The public is entitled to expect better digital services, and the public service needs more in-house experts to direct spending based on needs, Mr Shorten told The Australian Financial Review Business Summit in Canberra.
“If we don’t have people who speak the language, who have the knowledge to know the benefits and limitations of a particular software program we can end up with our tech uptake being vendor-driven.
“And vendor-driven does not always equate to user-centric. Big tech can hold government departments hostage to long contracts that build complexity into customer service.”
He said investment in in-house digital competency gave an excellent return. “Government should not restrict itself to procurement and project management because consultants would prefer we stay in our lane,” he said.
The Albanese government is trying to shave $3 billion off spending on consultants,
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