Working Papers Volume II

This the second volume of Working Papers that support The Foundations of the Digital State - an independent report written for the Scottish Government.

It was a practioner-led, holistic review of how the state creates services built on digital foundations.

The review covered the entire political cycle: from think-tanks and manifestos, through policy development, programmes of proposed legislation, bills and bill packs, parliamentary process and onto the traditional disciplines of design, technology, data, delivery and ending in-service management.

It identified structural and institutional lacunae in state structures arising from the transition from an analogue to digital world and makes a series of recommendations to address them. The recommendations are underpinned with proposed legislation.

The issues are:

• The government needs a single organisation with the mechanism to make decisions about how digital systems should work, and parliament needs a single structure to oversee those decisions.
• Decisions about what digital systems should do are made sub-optimally by parliament using ad-hoc repurposed mechanisms.
• The state lacks a research capability for digital systems.

1. unitary specification of services and systems
2. better iteration in service development
3. developing a research capability