Finance and Public Administration References Committee
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The Senate Finance and Public Administration References Committee Digital delivery of government services June 2018 © Commonwealth of Australia 2018 ISBN 978-1-76010-778-9 Senate Finance and Public Administration Committee Secretariat: Mr Tas Larnach (Acting Secretary) from 13 April 2018 Ms Ann Palmer (Secretary) until 12 April 2018 Ms Cathy Nembu (Acting Principal Research Officer) Ms Kathryn Cochrane (Senior Research Officer) Ms Nicole Baxter (Administrative Officer) until 11 April 2018 Ms Michelle Macarthur-King (Administrative Officer) from 12 April 2018 Ms Jo-Anne Holmes (Administrative Officer) from 12 April 2018 The Senate PO Box 6100 Parliament House Canberra ACT 2600 Ph: 02 6277 3530 Fax: 02 6277 5809 E-mail: [email protected] Internet: www.aph.gov.au/senate_fpa This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Australia License. The details of this licence are available on the Creative Commons website: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/au/. Printed by the Senate Printing Unit, Parliament House, Canberra. ii Membership of the Committee Members Senator Jenny McAllister (Chair) ALP, NSW Senator James Paterson (Deputy Chair) LP, VIC Senator David Fawcett (from 5.02.18 to 22.03.2018) LP, SA Senator Kimberley Kitching ALP, VIC Senator Bridget McKenzie (to 5.02.18) NAT, VIC Senator Amanda Stoker(from 22.03.2018) LP, QLD Senator Lee Rhiannon AG, NSW Senator Lisa Singh ALP, TAS Substitute Members Senator Jordon Steele-John (for Senator Rhiannon on 15.02.2018) AG, WA Participating Members Senator Rex Patrick CA, SA iii Table of Contents Membership of the Committee ........................................................................ iii Acronyms and abbreviations ............................................................................ xi Recommendations ............................................................................................. xv Chapter 1 ................................................................................................................... 1 Committee views and recommendations ................................................................ 1 The promise of digital transformation ................................................................. 1 Failure of leadership ............................................................................................ 4 The reality of 'digital transformation' so far ........................................................ 6 The cost of consultants and contractors .............................................................. 8 Building digital capability in the APS ................................................................. 8 Report Structure ................................................................................................. 12 Chapter 2 ................................................................................................................. 13 Background and context ........................................................................................ 13 Referral ................................................................................................................. 13 Overview .............................................................................................................. 13 Previous inquiries into government ICT .............................................................. 14 The Gershon Report .......................................................................................... 14 Audit of Australian Government ICT ............................................................... 15 The history of the Digital Transformation Agency .............................................. 16 The Digital Transformation Office .................................................................... 16 The creation of the Digital Transformation Agency ......................................... 17 The DTA’s current role ..................................................................................... 18 Leadership ......................................................................................................... 19 Recent Incidents ................................................................................................... 20 Australian Taxation Office 'outages' ................................................................. 21 Department of Human Service—'robo-debt' ..................................................... 21 v Department of Human Service's—'sale of Medicare card numbers on the darkweb' ............................................................................................................. 22 Department of Human Services—child support replacement system ............... 24 Australian National Audit Office Cyber Security Follow-up Report. .............. 24 Australian Bureau of Statistics eCensus denial of service ................................ 26 Department of Home Affairs ............................................................................. 26 The NAPLAN online failure ............................................................................. 27 The Australian Apprenticeship Management System ....................................... 27 The Biometric Identification Services Project .................................................. 28 Chapter 3 ................................................................................................................. 31 What is 'digital transformation' of government services .................................... 31 Introduction .......................................................................................................... 31 Perspectives .......................................................................................................... 31 Whether government is different from the private sector .................................... 33 What questions should government be asking? ................................................... 36 'Being digital' rather than 'doing digital' ............................................................... 37 Chapter 4 ................................................................................................................. 41 Challenges faced in undertaking digital transformation .................................... 41 Introduction .......................................................................................................... 41 Critical challenges to digital transformation ........................................................ 41 Systems architecture issues ............................................................................... 41 Infrastructure design ...................................................................................... 41 Managing complexity .................................................................................... 44 Legacy issues ................................................................................................. 47 Cyber security, risk and resilience .................................................................... 48 Privacy ............................................................................................................... 51 Digital identity ............................................................................................... 53 The diversity of users and their needs ............................................................... 55 Public expectations of government in digital transformation ........................ 55 vi The retention of traditional methods of engagement with citizens ............... 57 Website design ............................................................................................... 59 Data storage security ...................................................................................... 60 Chapter 5............................................................................................................ 65 Whole-of-Government Issues ................................................................................ 65 Introduction .......................................................................................................... 65 Leadership and accountability .............................................................................. 65 The need for an agreed vision ........................................................................ 65 Senior leadership and digital capability ............................................................ 65 Devolved decision-making ................................................................................ 67 Outsourcing has deskilled the APS ...................................................................... 67 The skills shortage ............................................................................................. 68 The generalist manager...................................................................................... 69 Cost-saving policy leads to deskilling ............................................................... 69 Rebuilding skills ................................................................................................... 70 An APS ICT digital profession ......................................................................... 70 Building digital competence .............................................................................. 71 Project management capability ...................................................................... 72 Current initiatives .............................................................................................