Agenda item

The Director of IT (Compass Point Business Services), Gary Stephens, to be invited to attend the meeting to answer members’ questions regarding their IT provision.

At the last meeting of the Panel, held on 11 December 2012, members had raised concerns regarding their IT provision and the following issues had been raised:

·        Was delivery of IT to members as good as it should be?

·        Was the current provision of members’ IT value for money?

·        Members were unhappy with the way in which problems and issues with their laptops were resolved and how long it sometimes took to resolve (or not, as was sometimes the case)

·        Members were unhappy with the required frequency of password changes

In response to the Panel’s request, the Director of IT was in attendance at the meeting to answer members concerns.  During the discussion, the following issues were raised:

·        What was the Director’s opinion of how things were currently working with regard to member IT provision?

• The current position was only adequate.  It was not easy for IT to support members.  There were problems in that there was a mixed estate of IT equipment. There was currently a drive to improve delivery.

·        Updates could not currently be made by members, the IT department had to undertake these updates.

• New solutions to overcome this were currently being investigated.

·        Passwords were a problem for some members.  Why did passwords have to be changed every 90 days?  Some members had difficulty changing their passwords. There were too many different passwords required to access the system.

• With regard to the timing of password resets, the frequency was laid down in government guidelines and was dictated from a security perspective, with 90 days being the maximum time limit permitted under current regulations.
• The difficulties with passwords were largely due to an accumulation of different offerings over the years which had tried to find solutions.  The current system was secure but had been complicated as a result of issues being dealt with on a piecemeal basis, and this was the reason that members were having difficulties.  The Director acknowledged that multiple passwords were far from ideal and advised that solutions were being looked at, including the trial of a single sign on product.                                                 

·        Would the new single sign on allow members to change passwords themselves?

• Yes, members would no longer have to visit the offices to have this done.

·        How long would the trial take and when could members hope to see changes to the way they logged in?

• The trial would be complete within six weeks, the system would then be tested and rolled out. Members would be asked to bring their laptops into the IT department to have the old encryption system removed, and a new one with single sign on added.  The time required to do this could be up to three days, although this was dependent on how many additional applications members had on their laptops. 

·        It was suggested that the trial should be undertaken by a group of members, and with members of varying IT ability.  Comment was also made as to whether the IT department was aware of how Councillors worked and the different requirements they had of their equipment?

• Following a period under trial, the solution appeared to work however, the Director of IT was looking to widen the trial and would be happy for a small group of members to be involved.  Using a cross section of people who used IT in different ways would provide a more informed result.
• Councillor C J T H Brewis, S Slade and R Perkins volunteered to be involved in the trial.  

·        New laptops had been provided to members during the last administration and at the start of the current one in 2012.  Was this likely to happen again?

• A robust system for member IT provision was required, over a longer period of time.

·        Why could South Holland emails not be diverted to private email accounts?

• Emails could not be diverted to private email accounts as this created security issues.  A secure and easy was of accessing South Holland emails was required, which did not necessitate diversion to another email account.

The Director of IT stated that with regard to future IT provision, agreement would be required on a build that all Councillors and the Leader were happy with.  All programmes not part of the Council build would have to be removed from members’ laptops.

Members requested that the Director of IT attend the next meeting of the Panel to provide an  update on progress.

DECISION:

That the information provided by the Director of IT be noted and that he be requested to attend the next meeting of the Panel to provide an update; and

That Councillors C J T H Brewis, S Slade and R Perkins trial the new single login product which, if successful, would in due course be rolled out to all members.

(The Director of IT and Councillor S Slade left the meeting following discussion of the above item).