Memoranda from the Director of PICT
Initial Submission (October 2006)
INTRODUCTION
1. PICT is the newly formed Parliamentary
Information and Communications Technology service, jointly owned
and managed by both Houses of Parliament, and delivering services
to the Members of both Houses. It was formed at the beginning
of 2006 by amalgamating a wide range of previously separate units,
including the former Parliamentary Communications Directorate
(PCD). The formation of PICT creates opportunities to improve
service levels to Members and exploit new technologies: we can
already point to some significant improvements in the last few
months, of which the dramatic reduction in the average helpdesk
queuing time (from nearly five minutes to less than one, despite
a significant increase in the call load) is perhaps the most tangible.
On the other hand the legacy which we are working to overcome
is one of incompatible systems and approaches, under-investment
in resilience and lack of overall strategic planning. At the same
time, the demands on Parliamentary ICT services have grown inexorably.
2. Even in the last year the number of parliamentary
network accounts has risen by around 13% (to almost 8,000); the
number of remote access accounts (all types) has risen by 15%
(to around 3,400); and the number of calls to the PICT helpdesk
in September was 57% higher than calls to the PCD helpdesk in
September 2005 (now almost 9,000 calls per month—daily totals
fluctuate enormously).
— PICT manages 91 IT rooms including
5 data centres and 235 servers.
— Parliamentary Network availability
in 2006 so far is 99.9%.
— Parliament received 1.5 million e-mails
in September that is 18 million coming in each year, all filtered
for spam and checked for viruses.
— We have 2.5 Terabytes of locally
stored data (equates to 416 million one-line e-mails or 80,000
Oxford English Dictionaries).
— 25 Terabytes of data is securely
stored off site.
— PICT supports 143 business information
systems held on servers and several 100s of small applications
on desk tops.
3. PICT is still developing as an organisation
and is determined to succeed in its primary objective, which is
to meet the needs of Parliament and parliamentarians. It therefore
welcomes this first opportunity to engage formally with the House
of Commons Administration Committee and hear the Committee's views
on priorities and strategies for the next few years.
Members use and depend on PICT-supported ICT
directly or indirectly throughout the day:
— The security pass system for Members
and their staff.
— Overnight print production and electronic
publication of parliamentary documents.
— E-mails, telephone systems, mobile
PDAs, voicemail, telephone directory.
— PCs, printers, laptops.
— Remote access for constituency offices.
— Electronic point of sale and stock
control systems in the restaurants.
— Electronic tabling of PQs, tracking
of Bill amendments.
— Hansard reporting and webcasting
of chamber and committees.
— Library systems tracking legislation,
PQs, EU documents,catalogue and loans, news and legal databases.
— Serjeant's systems managing accommodation,
maintenance, facilities etc.
— Service desk and IT training.
(a) BEST PRACTICE
IN THE
WORLD AT
LARGE
4. There is no single best practice solution
either to the supply of ICT services to Parliaments in general
or to the specific issue of multiple locations. The following
paragraphs look first at the technical configuration, then at
the supply model, and finally at performance measurement and benchmarking.
5. Most organisations with multiple locations,
complex data and high information security requirements impose
a tightly managed technical environment where users are strictly
limited as to the software they may use and security of access.
Parliament currently operates a more flexible model, as agreed
by the previous Information Committee, which has some necessary
elements of standardisation, but is less tightly managed, because
this gives individual Members greater freedom and flexibility;
it also allows Members themselves to influence rules on security
and acceptable use.
6. The present pattern of provision is relatively
recent. Until the 2001 election Parliament provided Members with
a network and dial-up Citrix access, but Members were responsible
for obtaining their own equipment and support. Standard PCs (plus
laptop) and printers were issued only from 2001 and the first
"refresh" of that equipment is now reaching completion.
Remote connectivity has developed substantially with the introduction
of the first Virtual Private Network (VPN) service in 2002/03.[1]
This year (2006) has seen the introduction of Personal Digital
Assistants (PDAs) for Members and the installation of a wireless
network in Portcullis House atrium. Constituency offices continue
to function with a wide variety of non-standard equipment and
configurations.
7. The present more flexible model works
successfully on the parliamentary estate because Westminster-based
in-House service analysts on x2001, backed by in-House engineers,
are trained to work with the mixed technical environment and can
generally trouble-shoot problems, if necessary by visiting Members'
offices. Taking into account contract management overheads and
risk sharing agreements, the outsourcing of routine support would
typically be 30-50% more expensive and the service level would
be more formally bounded by contract conditions and likely to
be less flexible for users.
8. Comprehensive support at the same level
for all constituency offices clearly raises different logistical
and cost issues, whether in-sourced or out-sourced, and has to
address the diversity of equipment and set-ups. Flexibility comes
at a cost, as the additional costs incurred by the "refresh"
project have demonstrated (see section f). Again, a more restricted
("locked down") technical environment and stricter policies
on access would reduce costs, with faults more quickly diagnosed
and corrected, but might be unacceptable to many Members. On the
other hand, 48% of Members surveyed in October 2005 said that
they would welcome the opportunity to switch from third party
to in-House support of their constituency offices, assuming that
PCD/PICT could offer a good service. These issues are covered
in greater detail in response to questions (d), (e) and (f).
9. As regards outsourcing more generally,
both public and private sectors operate a variety of models, depending
on the requirement. Single contract outsourcing in central and
local government has enjoyed some success, but also some high
profile failures. Issues to consider include the extra cost of
the contract management overheads and the risk of inflexibility/heavy
additional costs if the requirement changes during the contract
period. Few organisations take the risk of losing in-House capability
altogether. The industry trend (advised by Gartner[2]
and others) is towards multi-sourcing, which avoids undue dependency
on a single prime contractor. Our strategy for Parliament has
been to pull together and strengthen the in-House capability (hence
the creation of PICT), but then to consider outsourcing specific
components of the service in terms of risk, quality and value
for money. At present the following areas have significant outsourced
elements:
— Telephone operator bureau and voicemail
system.
— Installation and warranty-covered
support of desktop equipment.
— Network engineering support.
— Data backup, spam management.
— Electronic publishing and web hosting
(including education website).
— Major application support (PIMS).
— Major application development (HAIS).
10. This mixed model of in-House provision
and outsourcing has been established in Parliament in order to
address the issues of providing flexibility of services for Members
while at the same time using a range of "best of breed"
external providers to deliver specialist services. This model
means that the in-House provider must be able to manage effectively
a wide range of external contracts: PICT created a new expert
team in May 2006 specifically to achieve best practice in ICT
procurement and contract management.
11. We believe that the task of supporting
Parliamentary ICT is best carried out by a mix of in-House and
strategically outsourced components and that the support of core
parliamentary functions (including the work of Members) is often
best done by dedicated teams who can gain a better understanding
of how Members work and are able to develop knowledge of the parliamentary
environment.
12. Because Parliamentary IT management
was fragmented before the creation of PICT, there was no systematic
approach to performance measurement and benchmarking. PICT has
been developing a new user-oriented performance "dashboard"
of key performance indicators. This is still work in progress—for
example, the main service desk case logging software has just
been upgraded to capture more useful information. Third quarter
data will be available shortly and will be provided to the Committee.
13. PICT is also working to obtain a fuller
understanding of the true costs of ownership of systems as a prelude
to benchmarking. Two specific benchmarking exercises have been
initiated recently, both with the involvement of Gartner: one
looking at the overall costs of infrastructure and staffing at
the higher level of analysis; the other looking in much greater
detail at the service desk and desk-side engineering team.
14. PICT is fully committed to achieving
best practice in both performance measurement and benchmarking
and would welcome the views of the Committee as to what measures
it would wish to see in future.
(b) DEPARTMENTAL
STRUCTURE AND
GOALS
15. PICT was established January 2006 as
a fully joint service, but awaits legislation enabling staff to
be moved to a jointly employed basis. It replaces the nine separate
in-House units (including PCD) which previously provided ICT services
to the Members, Departments and Offices of Parliament. The aim
in creating PICT (backed by HC Commission and HL House Committee)
was to create the basis for more strategic management of assets
and staff, improved services, smarter procurement and contract
management, improved programme and project management and better
risk management. The overall aim of PICT is to achieve best practice
in the delivery, support and implementation of ICT in Parliaments.
16. The Director of PICT (Joan Miller) was
appointed jointly by the corporate officers (Clerks) of both Houses
in September 2005 and sits on both Management Boards, working
with the appropriate Member committees in each House. Both Houses
have corporate strategic plans and PICT is charged with delivering
the ICT elements in both plans. There are dedicated ring-fenced
budgets for Member Services in each House, but PICT is able to
negotiate single contracts and services providing better value
for money for both Houses. The requirements of both Houses are
in practice very similar and in many cases can be met most effectively
through shared solutions. The option of separate solutions remains
where this is more appropriate.
17. Early goals for PICT naturally reflected
the change from nine separate IT teams to a single joint House
service and the need for continuity of support during the transition.
As far as possible normal services were maintained to Members
and to departments of the House throughout the transition. Ongoing
projects were also supported, while the reorganisation proceeded
behind the scenes. Significant effort was put into risk assessment
and elimination of single points of failure. High priority was
given to resolving the difficulties with the VPN (see below).
18. The emphasis has now shifted to customer-oriented
service improvement (see section (e) below) and realising the
strategic benefits that can be obtained through technical consolidation,
strong programme management and a "whole enterprise"
view of information architecture. PICT will be drawing up a new
strategy and business plan by January 2007 and would welcome
the Committee's views on how the goals for Member services should
be set.
19. The content of the Parliamentary ICT
strategy is influenced (but not necessarily determined) by broader
trends in public sector best practice, such as the transition
to "e-government" and, more recently, to "t-government"
(transformational government), ie the improvement of public services
in quality and efficiency, using electronic infrastructure to
reconfigure services around citizen/customer needs.
20. A parliamentary example of this is that
PICT is responsible for developing the technology platforms to
support a radical upgrading of Parliament's public website as
called for by the House of Commons Modernisation Committee in
Connecting Parliament with the Public (2004). Similarly,
if the recommendations in the Modernisation Committee's latest
report (The Legislative Process) are agreed, PICT will
work with the Clerk's Department and House of Commons Library
on new ways of exploiting ICT to support the legislative process.
(c) IT STABILITY
V FLEXIBILITY
21. As explained above, the decision to
provide a very flexible software mix on PCs or laptops (as opposed
to a "locked down" environment) reflects the wishes
of the previous Information Committee and the recommendations
of the SSRB as approved by the House. The security controls (password
management and login restrictions) used by PICT have also been
determined for us by a joint committee of both Houses that took
advice on national requirements for good practice in this area.
PICT works within the guidelines established by the House, its
committees, and the House of Commons Commission, including policies
on the distinction between parliamentary and party use and on
security, and these can sometimes limit the range of technical
options available.
22. This flexible model allowed the former
PCD to achieve a highly stable network at Westminster with a reasonable
level of connectivity for constituency offices. The improvement
in the main network connection has been maintained by PICT, and
the resilience improved further with work carried out over the
summer of 2006. However connectivity via the new VPN was somewhat
degraded during the first half of this year, owing to an issue
caused by our supplier and which has now been resolved (an illustration
of our dependency on external contracts in a key area). Since
July the VPN has been working well. The network remains vulnerable
to mainly localised disruptive incidents, such as power outages,
but to a lesser extent than in earlier years. There have also
been occasional incidents when Members or their staff have inadvertently
disrupted services to others, eg by introducing their own local
wireless setup.
23. The model allows Members a degree of
freedom which appears to meet most requirements. The downside
of this is that the wide range of Member office environments makes
support (including routine replacement and upgrading of equipment)
more costly and problematic than it would otherwise be. Similarly,
the extension of support services, which many Members said that
they would welcome when surveyed, will be more difficult to provide
as long as the present diversity remains.
24. Mixed provision of support also raises
IT security issues because PICT cannot ensure that locally engaged
engineers have appropriate levels of knowledge and security clearance.
It is essential for the security of the network that machines
connected directly to Westminster via the VPN are adequately protected
and managed, whatever flexibility is allowed in other respects.
The Administration Committee and the Joint Committee on Security
have already approved measures to improve IT security and to promote
a strong IT security culture: PICT is taking these forward.
25. It is for Members to decide how much
flexibility they require in their use of ICT. Looking at technical,
logistical and security issues alone, greater standardisation
and a more managed IT environment would bring benefits. The Committee's
view on whether further standardisation is feasible and desirable
would be very helpful to PICT in its future planning.
(d) CONSTITUENCY
PROVISION
26. The target recommended by the SSRB and
set by the House that "the level and range of IT support
offered to constituency offices should be improved to a level
comparable with that offered on the Parliamentary Estate"
is challenging if "comparable" is taken to mean "similar".
The two main issues are the speed and reliability of online connections,
and the speed and quality of technical support. Some significant
progress has been made. For example, measures have already been
taken to provide training for Members' constituency-based staff
and to increase the resources available at Westminster to deal
with remote fixes.
27. Gaps in the quality of service clearly
remain. Neither the VPN, nor web-based services give Parliament
the degree of control over connectivity that it has on the Westminster
Estate. The decision by BT in 2005 to increase domestic ADSL bandwidth
has helped, but future changes in bandwidth and internet traffic
could impact on web-based connectivity. On the other hand, a network
of private land lines connecting constituency offices to Westminster
would be extremely expensive to install and rent.[3]
While a business case may be made for significant new expenditure
on constituency support, we assume that the Members Estimate Committee
will expect costs to be contained within reasonable limits.
28. The consultant tasked with investigating
constituency support reported at the end of January 2006 with
a wide range of detailed recommendations based on 247 returned
questionnaires and 22 visits to offices. Many of the recommendations
concerned the nature and quality of service offered to constituencies
from Westminster and the great majority of these have been taken
up in the course of the fundamental reorganisation of service
desk (helpdesk) staffing and processes and the subsequent Customer
Service Improvement Initiative. This is covered further in section
(e). The strategy to date has been to optimise the support that
can be offered to constituencies from the centre on the grounds
that other solutions to the local support requirement are likely
to be both expensive and complex to implement.
29. Local IT support covers a range of services.
Delivery, installation and repair of equipment can generally be
covered by the procurement arrangements, supplemented by extended
warranty. However, for most Members, support also needs to encompass
the setting up and maintenance of small local networks, installation
and training in the use of software and routine "health check"
site visits to check on system set-up, apply any routine upgrades,
check on file management, and back-up and check on the general
serviceability of equipment (ie preventative maintenance and advice).
These were the key areas where Members when surveyed felt that
they needed local support.
30. It is probable that yet more advice
and "remote fixing" can be provided from Westminster
and the technologies to enable this are still developing, but
full support as defined above will require at least occasional
site visits and some new approaches to software support. We understand
that most Members would prefer a single point of contact and a
service which recognises and works with their specific requirements.
Many of the Members surveyed last year wanted what they described
as a "field-engineering force" managed directly or indirectly
by Parliament.
31. Assuming that Members require IT support
in their constituency offices as summarised above, and that at
least some also value the ability to have non-standard set-ups,
locally supported, the best way forward seems to be for PICT to
offer a range of differentiated and clearly defined service levels.
These could be branded—platinum, gold, silver etc—for
maximum clarity about responsibility and sources of support. For
example, "platinum" might provide a PICT-supported local
area network (LAN) for PICT equipment only and connectivity guidance
for any non-PICT equipment, with next day on-site technical support
and regular "health checks"; by contrast a minimal "bronze"
service would offer only connectivity for PICT provided laptops.
32. Recruiting and managing a UK-wide force
of PICT engineers specifically to support Members' offices is
possible, but a more feasible alternative would be for PICT to
manage a third-party contract or contracts with regionally-based
suppliers, ensuring suitable levels of security clearance and
quality control, with the PICT service desk, appropriately resourced,
providing a single clearing house and "one-stop shop"
for Members. A permanent new service with significant cost implications
would need to be approved in due course by a resolution of the
House.
33. In the interim, given appropriate approval
and funding, a pilot enhanced service could be developed for a
sub-set of constituency offices from January. Proposals for full
implementation would then be brought back to the Committee in
the spring.
34. The Committee's views and recommendations
on these issues would be of great assistance to PICT given that
much depends on understanding Members' changing requirements,
the acceptability of different models for support and the likely
take-up of different options.
(e) CUSTOMER
SERVICE
35. The PICT Director of Operations, Matthew
Taylor, has overall responsibility for Member services. Reporting
to him are Members Computing Officers for each House and a Customer
Services Manager who oversees the service desk, service engineers,
customer services team and user training.
36. The PICT service desk currently operates
between 8.30 am and 8.00 pm on weekdays when the House is sitting
and between 9.00 am and 6.00 pm when it is not. Between these
hours Members may either call the desk on x2001 or email with
specific requests for service. In addition to this, the service
desk is staffed from 11.00 am to 3.00 pm at weekends. Issues referred
to the service desk are either resolved by the analyst taking
the call or passed to a more specialised engineer who may visit
a Member's office if necessary. Site visits may also be made to
constituency offices to deal with PICT-provided equipment, if
problems cannot be resolved remotely.
37. PICT's service desk has been reorganised
over the summer, with improved organisation, processes, software,
training and staffing. Despite the continuing growth in calls
to the service desk, this work has enabled a further marked reduction
in the time that calls wait in the queue to be answered—from
a weekly average of around four minutes to under one minute (and
under 20 seconds for significant periods). Twenty seconds has
been set as a sustainable short-term target and this is now within
our sights.
38. Many of the other concerns raised by
Members and their staff in the October 2005 constituency questionnaire
have also been addressed.[4]
Indeed, one of PICT's key objectives for 2006-07 has been to improve
the level of services for Members and their staff. For example,
we have run a series of customer services training sessions over
the summer recess to ensure that our staff understand and are
focussed on our customers' concerns; as set out elsewhere in this
paper we launched new services for mobile devices and wireless
connection; and we are developing a new training strategy to include
floor walking and surgery services at Westminster, for implementation
in March 2007; constituency support proposals are covered in the
previous section; a constituency wireless network pilot is planned
for January/February 2007.
39. A second phase of the customer service
improvement initiative has recently begun. The emphasis is on
improving the rate at which problems are resolved. This involves
redesigning the service engineer (desktop support) function, and
in its first two weeks has increased the work rate of field engineers
by 10%. This initiative will also investigate how the customer
services team can be organised to provide the prime point of contact
for MPs and their staff, for implementation in January 2007. Current
proposals are that the Members Computing Officers and customer
services staff will be brought together into one team to provide
this prime point of contact for all queries other than service
desk queries.
40. There are several other areas where
PICT is seeking to improve services to Members over the next year.
We are currently examining the feasibility of extending PICT service
desk and Westminster engineering support to a full 7 day a week,
24 hour a day support model. The opportunity arises from the creation
of PICT because the business case depends on bringing together
the support arrangements for the network, individual users and
critical applications such as those which support overnight publication
of House documents.
41. We also plan to extend and improve the
user training which is offered to both Members and their staff.
We would like to look at this alongside the training offered to
Members' staff by the Department of Finance and Administration
and to develop a more flexible range of training offerings. This
again would respond to the findings of the constituency support
survey. While we accept (another point from the survey) that Members'
constituency staff do not see themselves as technicians, a better
level of awareness would reduce the need to make calls to the
service desk and promote better housekeeping of IT equipment which
in turn will reduce the number of service failures.
42. We would welcome the Committee's
views on the priorities for further improvements to customer service.
(f) NEW EQUIPMENT
ROLL-OUT
43. There has been a full "lessons
learned" exercise on the Members' equipment refresh project
2005-06. Given that Members newly elected in 2005 had been provided
on arrival at Westminster with new Dell equipment, Windows XP
and Office 2003, the aim of this project was to provide the remaining
520 returned Members with the same updated equipment and software.
This was a complex logistical undertaking. One of the conclusions
of the "lessons learned" exercise is that, although
the contract offered excellent value for money in terms of equipment
unit costs, we underestimated the complexities of installation,
and therefore the project was initially under-resourced.
44. In particular the third-party engineers
engaged to carry out installations frequently encountered complex
non-standard set-ups in Members' offices, with customised and
locally loaded software needing to be transferred to new PCs,
and as a consequence time-consuming "scripts", including
complex data transfer, had to be devised. At the same time some
Members assumed that the contract provided for a higher level
of service than was actually the case. There were also problems
in obtaining full survey information in advance on such matters
as space constraints, availability of power supplies and the layout
of network ports and in a few cases this meant that it took two
or three visits to complete one installation.
45. When the time comes for a further
refresh, we believe that, however the contract is structured,
there should be a dedicated engineering team trained to understand
Members' requirements and that the level of service should be
specifically agreed in advance by the responsible committee on
behalf of Members. Consideration should also be given to a more
closely managed deployment schedule: difficulty in contacting
all the Members concerned and arranging convenient times for installation
has meant that the 2005-06 refresh has taken longer than planned
and that Members who have not responded (20 as of 5 October) will
be updated by regular PICT staff after project close.
(g) FUTURE EQUIPMENT
46. PICT is keeping pace with technological
change in many ways. An interim wireless solution has just been
put in place for the atrium area of Portcullis House. This new
service, which will be publicised more widely in the next week
or two, will allow Members full access to the parliamentary network
using their laptops in the atrium area. We are planning a fuller
solution to this requirement by April 2007, which will extend
wireless coverage to other suitable areas of the parliamentary
estate, including internet access for Members who have XP on their
own laptops.
47. We have also addressed the particular
requirement previously identified by the Administration Committee[5]
for temporary wireless access to the parliamentary network in
selected temporary Member accommodation in the period following
an election, and this is now ready to put in place whenever an
election is called. This would involve temporary surface cables
and antennae in committee rooms and is therefore a tactical solution
which would be installed during a dissolution and removed once
all Members have moved into their offices. A more permanent solution
would involve further detailed planning as a range of options
could involve buildings and furniture disturbance. If the Modernisation
Committee proposals are approved this year, detailed planning
will commence immediately.
48. This year also sees the implementation
of mobile computing for Members. The PDA (personal digital assistant)
pilot has been completed successfully with 50 Members from both
Houses and the business case has been approved for full implementation.
This means that any Member who wishes can now request and receive
a PDA and approximately 50 PDAs have been provided over the summer
recess period. A further 450 devices for both Houses will be available
for delivery by the end of the year. PDAs allow Members mobile
access to most network functionality, including emails, calendar,
tasks, word-processing, spread-sheets, internet access and, of
course, mobile telephone calls. A possible development for the
future would be to offer access to parliamentary web pages (including
Hansard) in small screen format.
49. We are currently appraising possible
solutions to the problem of poor mobile phone reception in some
parts of Portcullis House. This will also affect PDAs—but
we expect to resolve the problem by September 2007.
50. The redesign of the intranet is intended
to improve search and navigation for all users, but it also provides
the opportunity to re-group pages dedicated to Members' services
in a virtual "Members' Portal", where via the web we
would bring together access to all Member services from a single
page.
51. This would tie in with plans to develop
and improve Members' access to financial and other transactional
information. This could include, for example, some self-service
functionality in Agresso through a web front end, for submission
and review of Members' expense claims. A feasibility study is
due to begin in April 2007. A separate strand of activity will
look at the feasibility of offering other services to Members
via the parliamentary intranet, eg Refreshment Department bookings
and payments. The Committee's views on priorities in this area
would be very helpful.
52. The Committee asked about plans for
the annunciator system following analogue switch-off. PICT works
in this area in collaboration with the Parliamentary Estates Directorate.
Provisional plans have been made for a phased changeover starting
in 2010. The exact nature and phasing of the changeover is yet
to be determined and full consideration will be given to the relationship
between the annunciator system and other systems, such as the
intranet.
53. Information and Communication Technologies
are developing rapidly. It would be a high risk for Parliament
to rush into adopting every new offering that appears on the market,
particularly given the continuing requirement for secure and resilient
systems. On the other hand we recognise that Parliament should
not and does not wish to lag behind in using technology to manage
information and communicate. The creation of PICT provides an
opportunity to develop our infrastructure strategically and provide
services that respond dynamically to the needs of Parliament.
54. We would also like to take this opportunity
to consult the Administration Committee about how it would like
to be involved in decisions about new developments—whether
it would wish to hold regular meetings with PICT management on
service levels and priorities, or whether it would prefer to review
issues and progress on an annual or half-yearly basis.
1 A voice and/or data network with protected access
that offers the features and characteristics of a private network,
even though the communications pass over the public network. Back
2
Gartner is a research-based company recognised as a credible
and independent commentator on the use of IT in organisations
across the world. Back
3
There would be new costs each time that a constituency office
changed location. A rough estimate suggests initial installation
costs of around £2.2 million and annual rental charges of
around £12.5 million. Back
4
The main recommendations arising from the Members survey were:
1. Improvement in helpdesk services, including reduced wait times
and optimise service response and process at the first point of
contact at the helpdesk.
2. Service engineer customer service at Westminster was generally
felt to be satisfactory, but improvements in wireless network
access and mobile connection support was requested.
3. PICT should assess the options for increased hours of support
to reflect the hours worked by MPs and constituency offices.
4. Improvement in training support, with floor walking support
for MPs. WWP courses were felt to be good but needed more publicity.
5. Improved services to constituency offices, with more localised
technical support and training and local area network management,
and if feasible, wireless networks for more flexible constituency
office use.
6. PICT to develop and increase the role of the Customer Services
team to be the prime point of contact with MPs and office staff
on all IT matters, apart from the day to date operation and use
of the Service Desk. Back
5
Post-election services. Back
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