Management Toolkit

UK leads way on public IT spending

Kablenet.com

Published: 31 May 2005 16:40 BST

The UK spends more on public sector IT than any other European country, according to research published on 31 May, 2005.

Total expenditure for the UK is estimated at €21bn (£14bn), a figure which is 40 percent larger than either Germany or France, according to latest research from analyst Kable.

Across Europe the total spending is €87bn this year, a figure set to rise to €94bn by 2007. UK spending is almost a quarter (23 percent) of this total, says the report titled ICT Spend in the European Public Sector.

The high level of spending is mainly due to big investments made in e-government and back office infrastructure. It covers major IT projects such as the £6bn Connecting for Health initiative, the Criminal Justice IT programme and the Defence Information Infrastructure.

According to the report, there are sharp differences between UK spending and other European countries. The UK spends 37 percent on external services such as consultancy and outsourcing, while the European average is 16 percent, for example.

Other findings are that:

Denmark tops the table for per capita investment on public sector IT at €384 per head. The UK spends €336 per person
Estonia leads on spending as a proportion of GDP at 1.15 percent. The UK is closely behind at 1.14 percent, while the European average is 0.8 percent
Overall growth rates for public sector IT across Europe is 3.3 percent in 2006

Kable analyst Scott Bryan, said: "There are other countries spending similar amounts per capita or as a proportion of their GDPs, but they have smaller economies than the UK. From the larger countries the UK is by far the biggest spender and has emerged as the leader in breadth and diversity of its investment in public sector IT."