Public Accounts Committee calls out legacy IT

The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) has urged the federal government to repair legacy IT points if it needs to succeed with synthetic intelligence (AI)-powered public sector initiatives.

The PAC’s Use of AI in authorities report famous that AI depends on high-quality knowledge to be taught. Nonetheless, the committee was instructed by the Division for Science, Innovation and Know-how (DSIT) that authorities knowledge is usually of poor high quality and locked away in out-of-date legacy IT techniques.

An estimated 28% of IT techniques utilized by the federal government are legacy techniques, protecting each software program and {hardware}. These, as outlined by DSIT, embody IT merchandise which have reached end-of-life, are now not supported by the provider and are not possible to replace. In accordance with DSIT’s definition of legacy IT, these techniques are now not cost-effective or are thought of to be above the appropriate danger threshold.

In its Digital and Information Roadmap 2022-25, the federal government dedicated to making sure that all the 72 highest-risk “red-rated” legacy techniques throughout the federal government have remediation plans in place. Nonetheless, the PAC reported that 21 legacy IT techniques nonetheless lack remediation funding.

“DSIT instructed us that it was a matter of urgency that the difficulty of legacy techniques in authorities is addressed, not solely to benefit from the alternatives supplied by AI, but in addition to handle different dangers, together with cyber safety vulnerabilities,” the PAC report said.

DSIT stated it will prioritise “the techniques which have essentially the most priceless knowledge” and “the best ranges of safety vulnerability”.

From a legacy {hardware} perspective, the PAC stated DSIT considers cloud companies as a method for the federal government to maneuver away from sustaining massive datacentres. Nonetheless, it famous that there’s a trade-off between concentrating utilization to attain higher worth for cash and diversifying suppliers to hunt higher resilience and safety.

“As a part of our inquiry into authorities cyber resilience, the Cupboard Workplace instructed us that, ‘numerous our legacy techniques are working off a really small variety of cloud suppliers, and till you repair a few of the legacy points, it is vitally troublesome to maneuver off a few of the cloud companies which might be there’,” wrote the report authors.

In accordance with DSIT, the brand new Authorities Digital Service (GDS) will work with HM Treasury to overview all spending bids for legacy remediation to evaluate their credibility and ambition. The PAC famous that GDS may even be monitoring the allotted cash, which had too typically been reallocated elsewhere up to now. There are additionally plans for pilots of funding on a steady enchancment foundation to make sure that IT techniques are maintained over the long run.

Whereas the primary points within the record of limitations to public sector AI deployments concern legacy IT, the PAC warned that knowledge sharing in authorities stays an issue.

A just lately printed blueprint for contemporary digital authorities units out the federal government’s intention to work to scale back the limitations to sharing knowledge by implementing requirements, frameworks and instruments. This consists of the creation of a nationwide knowledge library to make it simpler to seek out and reuse knowledge throughout the general public sector.

The PAC report recognises the significance of knowledge transparency to enhance belief. Nonetheless, the report famous that as of January 2025, solely 33 data had been printed on the federal government web site set as much as present higher transparency.

Together with the problems of legacy IT, knowledge sharing and belief, the Public Accounts Committee additionally raised issues in regards to the digital expertise hole. Regardless of authorities efforts to bolster digital expertise within the public sector, the PAC stated it remained sceptical that these reforms would deal with the difficulty the place earlier makes an attempt have failed.

Among the many suggestions made by the PAC, which embody measuring the price of legacy IT, the report stated the federal government wants to ascertain a mechanism for systematically gathering and disseminating intelligence on pilots and their analysis. The PAC additionally really helpful the federal government determine frequent and scalable AI merchandise and assist their growth and roll-out at scale.

Wanting particularly on the procurement of AI, the report’s authors urged DSIT, in collaboration with the Cupboard Workplace, to set out publicly how its proposed AI sourcing and procurement framework will get one of the best from all suppliers in a market dominated by a small variety of world expertise corporations and guarantee alternatives can be found for small suppliers.