Publication - FOI/EIR release

Digital Directorate Digital Services & Products Delivered: FOI release

Published: 9 July 2020
Directorate: Digital Directorate
Topic: Public sector
FOI reference: FOI/202000043003
Date received: 28 May 2020
Date responded: 25 June 2020

Information request and response under the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002

Information requested

1. Annual budget of the Scottish Government digital directorate over the last 6 years.
2. Budget for the directorate broken down year by year.
3. Number of live products or services delivered by the directorate over the last 6 years.
4. What these live services were, and where I can find them on the internet.
5. What the objectives are for the directorate in 20/21 F/Y.
6. How many staff the directorate have today.

Response

Before answering this question, it might be helpful if I set out some background information on the digital directorate.

The directorate is currently responsible for a number of different work streams:

Digital connectivity – the delivery of fixed broadband, mobile and other forms of connectivity, particularly where these are not being delivered through commercial mechanisms. This includes major capital projects such as Digital Scotland Superfast Broadband and the R100 programme and the capital budgets associated with these forms a significant part of the overall directorate budget.
Data, analysis and Statistics – the directorate includes both the Chief Data Officer and Chief Statistician roles and includes a team of professional data analysts and statisticians that produce public information and provide support to policy teams across government
Operations - the directorate provides and runs the core corporate IT systems of the Scottish Government and its shared service users.
Staff training and development – the team coordinates the professional development of the digital, data and technology community and is responsible for running the Scottish Digital Academy
Digital Transformation - the team sets standards and defines processes for service design, and digital and data standards, leads on core platforms, engages with the market and provides resources, on a shared service basis, to organisations across the Scottish Government landscape. The directorate also facilitates the development of innovative services through its CivTech business incubator.
Policy: The directorate is responsible for advising Ministers on matters relating to digital policy and delivery.

Over the time period in question, the nature and balance of these responsibilities have changed, making like for like comparisons difficult. However, please find the following responses to your questions.

1. Annual budget of the Scottish Government digital directorate over the last 6 years –

Please refer to the Table 1 in Annex 1.
Although all annual budgets for SG Directorates can be viewed in the yearly Published Budget Bills on Parliaments Web Site I have provided the requested information in Table 1 and I’ve also included the budget bill internet links for your assistance.

2. Budget for the directorate broken down year by year –

Please refer to Table 1 in Annex 1.
This question has been answered with the same data set as question 1.

3. Number of live products or services delivered by the directorate over the last 6 years –
Given the variety of work described above and the nature of the different outputs resulting from that work, it has not been possible to provide a single, definitive numerical value in answer to this question, within the time frame to answer the FoI. I have however provided some statistics within Table 2, Annex 1 that provides further context on the number of deliverables as part of the product / service offering.

4. What these live services were, and where I can find them on the internet –
Please refer to Table 2 in Annex 1
The purpose of the Digital Directorate is to design, deliver and enable excellent digital services, programmes and policies that deliver the benefits of the digital world. As described above, it covers a wide variety of different responsibilities including major capital investment projects, business incubation, strategy and policy development, statistical and data services, core operational IT services and enabling service development in teams and agencies across the Scottish Government landscape.
I have responded to your question on the understanding that the Digital Directorate products and services are defined within the original Digital Public Services Strategy – Published 2012 and the updated Digital Strategy – Published 2017.

I have provided internet links to the published Digital Strategies and where appropriate to Digital Directorate products delivered by those strategies. I have also provided information on the wider set of products and services of Digital Directorate that are referred to in our published strategies.
5. What the objectives are for the directorate in 20/21 F/Y –
There are six main delivery priorities / objectives for the Digital Directorate:

Development and operation of common platforms (identity, payments, publishing and cloud) as critical national infrastructure and an enabler of future public sector reform.
Positioning Scotland as an international centre of data expertise to stimulate new business growth and improve the quality of public service delivery.
Transformation of shared IT services (iTECS) to sustain critical national infrastructure and enable delivery of national performance outcomes.
Developing the technical, leadership and commercial skills we need to succeed.
Delivery of the R100 superfast broadband programme to stimulate inclusive and sustainable economic growth and reduce carbon footprint.
Supporting Scottish government IT services and staff, including developing appropriate measures to enable greater flexibility when working from home.

6. How many staff the directorate has today – 431.

About FOI

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