2.1 The Council's current websites are not fit for purpose and elected members have requested that short-term improvements are made and an option appraisal in relation to future strategy is brought forward at the earliest opportunity.

2.2 Independent analysis of usability and content has been undertaken, improvements made and a further series of tactical improvements to the websites will be made over the next six months. Replacement of the underlying technical platform will however be required in the medium term.

2.3 The success of a new website platform will be largely dependent on addressing issues with the governance, resourcing and management of the Council's presence on the internet.

2.4 A range of options are being considered but the costs of a replacement platform and migration/change programme are likely to exceed £1m. Budget is not available to take such a project forward. It is recommended that this project is prioritised within the 2009/12 budget process and in the interim a procurement exercise is undertaken to support the option appraisal process.

Background

3.1 A report to the Smart City & ICT Partnership Elected Member Sounding Board on 9 January highlighted issues with the stability, usability and design of the Council's main website. Elected members noted short-term plans for improving the stability of the internet site, delivery of a new intranet and improvements planned to web content. The Board also noted that proposals would be brought forward as soon as possible for longer-term development of the websites.

3.2 The new intranet site went live on a phased basis for all Council staff over the summer. In parallel, significant technical work has been undertaken by BT and 3^rd party suppliers to stabilise the website platform. Availability of the sites has improved significantly from under 96.5% to over 99.5% during this period.

3.3 Benchmarking of the usability and content of the Council's website has been undertaken using the standard scenarios used in the annual UK-wide SOCITM Better Connected benchmarking survey of local authority websites. An independent report was also commissioned from Innovation Digital, the design agency who have developed the Edinburgh Brand website. The results of this work have been presented to the Communications Service who are taking forward plans to improve the quality and design of the site. Appendix 1 provides an outline of these short-term improvement plans.

3.4 It should however be noted that improvement work is limited both by the functionality of the technology currently supporting the websites and the resources available in the Communications Service to take forward this work.

3.5 A number of other issues are apparent in the way that the Council presents information on the web and these are outlined below:

3.6 The Council currently spends approximately £500k per annum for the support, licensing and hosting of the internet, intranet and other corporate managed web services. Further costs are incurred by departments in hosting separate websites and services developed for their own purposes. It was anticipated at the feasibility stage of planning of this project that cost savings could be achieved from ongoing support by rationalising our websites which would offset implementation costs and provide a sustainable business case.

3.7 It was agreed that a full option appraisal should be undertaken to consider a project to refresh, redesign and improve the Council's websites. Whilst it is recognised that such a project will require a new technology platform it is only likely to be successful if the issues identified at 3.5 of this report are addressed.

Option Appraisal

3.8 A detailed technical requirements specification has been prepared over the last few months which captures the existing requirements of the Council's web platforms and a range of new capabilities. This specification of requirements will be used to assess the potential of different technical solutions and service delivery models.

3.9 Four options are being considered for the future delivery of the Council's websites. These are:

3.10 Proposals for the BT options identified above have been developed and these range from a cost of £1.74m for implementation plus use of £700k of pre-paid BT labour to £850k for implementation plus use of £400k of pre-paid labour. Ongoing support costs range from roughly cost neutral to £80k more than the current cost base. It should be noted that in costing support, BT has included a technical refresh of the platforms in 2013/14 which is not fully costed into the current service model. In addition, Council project team costs are estimated at a minimum of £144k over the 12 months of implementation.

3.11 The difference between the two options put forward by BT is that Microsoft Sharepoint is an enterprise-wide tool not purely for web site management but for team working, collaboration and document management. Sharepoint fits best within the Council's overall technical roadmap providing a range of collaborative features for departments to deploy at lower cost in the future. The Immediacy solution is a specialist web site management product which meets most of the Council's stated requirements but benefits from having a significant market share in local government websites and functionality which can be adopted `out of the box' at lower cost.

3.12 Initial discussions have also taken place with NHS Lothian who currently use the Immediacy product for their intranet although a fully costed proposal has not yet been developed. This option would deliver some significant strategic benefits in allowing the development of a shared or joint intranet for the Health & Social Care Department covering both Council and NHS employees. It would also support closer partnership working and delivery of the shared services agenda. Difficulties could potentially be encountered as the Council would have to enter into a separate external web-hosting contract for the internet site. It would also be more difficult in the future to present fully transactional services on the website where these are based on back-office systems on the BT network. There is a significant likelihood that in the future some of the web infrastructure would require to be recreated by BT to allow this type of development to take place.

3.13 External procurement is also a potential option which could be explored and would provide the Council with a definitive assurance in terms of the option appraisal. This process will however add a further 6-8 months to the timescales for a 12 month implementation to allow the EU procurement process to take place. This option would also leave the Council with difficulties in the development of transactional services similar to those outlined in 3.10 above with the potential for duplication of infrastructure and costs.

3.14 It should be noted that with both of the options presented in 3.10 and 3.11 above then the internal Council team would have to be extended to undertake activities which would be managed by BT through the use of pre-paid resource. Additional risk is also likely to be incurred in managing a range of suppliers.

3.15 It is clear that a business case based on cash-releasing efficiency savings and a positive return-on-investment from rationalisation of platforms alone is unlikely to be made. The importance of the website to the Council in terms of its brand, identity and future communication and customer services strategies is unchallengeable. Significant non-cashable savings could be anticipated through a strategy of actively marketing use of the web channel to our customers rather than use of more expensive communication channels.

Next Steps

3.16 Whilst further work is required to complete the option appraisal, elected members have highlighted that refresh and upgrade of the Council's websites is a key priority. The current technical platform is not sustainable and will require to be replaced in the future. Whichever option is selected above, it will be essential to put in place a project team to take forward a 12-18 month implementation.

3.17 The option appraisal requires to be balanced against both our existing requirements and the Council's future direction in relation to ICT developments. For instance, if the Council aspired towards a strategy of implementation of enterprise-wide document management and project team collaboration than the Microsoft option would make more sense than a specialist web product.

3.18 Technically it is quite possible to procure the design, management, ongoing support and hosting of the Council's internet site separately from our main ICT network and data centre contract. In fact, many public sector organisations (Scottish Government, NHS, Fife Council, East Lothian Council) currently adopt this strategy. There is a significant probability that the costs of such an arrangement would be less than requesting BT to undertake this activity on our behalf. This is due to the fact that specialist hosting organisations can offer services to the Council on a shared infrastructure rather than building a specific solution for our particular needs.

3.19 Balanced against this benefit is that such a strategy would be inelegant requiring BT to continue to support an intranet (unless NHS Lothian support it) and in the future to host web infrastructure themselves to allow the development of fully transactional web services with back office systems. The full benefits in the future of integrated content, document and records management through a product such as Sharepoint would be lost. It is estimated that procurement would add six months to project delivery timescales and add additional risk to the project and ongoing service in the management of multiple suppliers.

3.20 Whilst a business case based on cash-releasing efficiency savings is not at this stage apparent it would be recommended that funding for the project is considered within the 2009/12 budget process as part of the wider Achieving Excellence in Customer Services programme. A business case which will include non-cashable benefits will be created in parallel to the procurement and option appraisal process.

3.21 In the interim, Corporate Services will, where possible within the limited resources available, establish a project team which would also support delivery of short-term improvements to the websites in advance of a new technical platform. Given that resources are not available to implement a solution in the current year then a procurement exercise should be undertaken to allow full consideration of options available to the Council from providers other than BT.

3.22 It is recommended that governance and organisation of web development is considered urgently by the Council Management Team. The Head of Communications will bring forward a report, following consultation with departments, as soon as possible.

4.1 The development of an effective website and intranet for the Council has the potential to support and underpin more effective management of channels of communication with the customer. This would support a reduction in printing of publications and forms, a reduction in mail and a reduction in the potential need for customers to visit Council offices. It is recommended that a clear baseline and targets are set over the next year for moving publications and customer contact to the web channel within the context of the Achieving Excellence programme.

5.1 It is estimated that a project to redesign, refresh and upgrade the technical platform supporting the Council's web sites will cost as a maximum approximately £1m plus require allocation of £400k of the pre-paid resources from our partnership with BT.

5.2 Resources to undertake a project within the current financial year are not available given the decision to use £3.781m of the BT Efficiency Fund to balance the 2008/11 budget in February. This project will require to be considered as a priority as part of the 2009/12 revenue budget process.

6 Recommendations

6.1 It is recommended that the Smart City & ICT Partnership Elected Member Sounding Board:

Appendix 1

Short-Term Improvements Planned by Communication Service

Appendix 2

Map of Current Websites

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