Committee publication · Report · 3 June 2026 · HC 61
1st Report - Rewiring the state: Delivering digital government
From: Science, Innovation and Technology Committee
Inquiry: Digital centre of government
Government response deadline: 20 July 2026
Summary
The Science, Innovation and Technology Committee reports on the government's digital transformation agenda, examining whether the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology's plan to create a 'truly digital state' is achievable. Despite spending £26 billion annually on digital technology, the Committee finds the government lacks a detailed, measurable plan, and identifies critical gaps in funding transparency, digital workforce capacity, data security practices, and vendor independence that must be addressed for success.
Key findings
- Digital spending of £26 billion annually is fragmented across departments with inadequate transparency, preventing informed policy decisions and accountability; GDS must require standardized annual disclosure of all digital and data spend.
- The public sector workforce of ~100,000 digital professionals is unevenly distributed, with too few in leadership roles; contractors account for 40% of headhead costs whilst earning three times civil service salaries, indicating structural inefficiency.
- Four critical barriers obstruct digital transformation: hype (unsupported £45bn productivity claims), legacy systems (outdated insecure infrastructure), vendor lock-in (heavy dependence on Palantir, Microsoft, AWS), and sovereignty gaps (reliance on overseas providers).
- Data security failures are systemic and persistent: the 2022 Defence Ministry breach exposing thousands of Afghan nationals, UK Biobank datasets advertised on Chinese e-commerce platforms, and an Information Security Review identifying recurring patterns of poor data hygiene across government.
- The planned digital ID lacks clear design, cost, and scope details; even non-mandatory rollout cannot succeed without modernised digital infrastructure and restored public trust in government data handling practices.
Recommendations
- GDS must require all departments and public bodies to disclose annual spending on digital and data-driven activities using jointly-developed guidance (with HM Treasury and NAO), published as part of Public Expenditure Statistical Analyses.
- By end of Spending Review period, increase resource-funded digital spend from current 43-46% to 75% (versus capital budgets) to reflect modern service delivery reality; GDS and Treasury should drive this target and report annually.
- GDS should develop and publish a comprehensive framework to evaluate digital spend performance with metrics for departmental accountability; departments must publish annual progress reports against this framework.
- Publish succession plans for all digital and data director/director general roles; extend digital skills assessments to include future permanent secretaries; appoint a Government Chief Digital Officer at permanent secretary level.
- Digital workforce strategy must include: departmental plans to reduce contractor proportions; clear pathway to one-in-ten civil servants in technology/digital roles by 2030; cultural transformation strategy developed with trade unions.
- Publish quarterly progress reports on information and data security metrics via single public tracker; name departments not adopting basic hygiene practices (e.g. Microsoft 365 labelling); remediation timelines mandatory.
- Full publication of UK Biobank internal review findings; government and UKRI must specify technical protections for citizen data and assess whether the organisation merits continued public funding given data hygiene failures.
Tone
CriticalTopics
Key actors
Dame Chi Onwurah (Committee Chair), Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT), Government Digital Service (GDS), Laura Gilbert (former head, Incubator for AI), Emily Middleton (director-general, DSIT), Jeni Tennison (Executive Director, Connected by Data), UK Biobank, Cabinet Office
Notable line
“Without public consent the government will struggle to deliver its digital transformation ambitions. This, and the other challenges identified in our report, are not insurmountable, but they have not yet been properly identified or addressed.”
Key Quotes
“The government has set out its intention to make the UK "a truly digital state", transforming citizens' experiences of the health, education, and justice systems, and other public services.”
“… public sector spending on digital technology: is not particularly comprehensively mapped. Exercises to do that to the n th degree have been done over the years.”
“"there is a standard of digital expertise that is far below industry and far below where it ought to be", 39 and that often "… people in charge of technical delivery are existing civil servants who have been the director general of something else.”
“You have to be able to give people salaries in a range where they do not feel stupid for taking the job… When people are younger and they have a dream, they are prepared to take a lower salary …”
“It is a fundamental duty of government, public sector bodies and bodies in receipt of public funds to keep safe the data they hold on citizens. This duty has not been consistently upheld in the UK for some time.”
“"the commitment in terms of digital ID is to have the most secure system and protections in place of anywhere across Government".”
Source · parliament.uk record ↗