Thank you for Subscribing to Gov Business Review Weekly Brief
Prior to September 2018, Scotland did not have its own welfare system. All social security benefits were administered by the UK benefits system.
I was asked to set-up the Chief Digital Office function in February 2017 by the Scottish Government, with the aim of planning, designing and delivering the digital and technology estate for the first devolved social security benefits in December 2018. Just 22 months later. This was no mean feat. We had to build a new social security system from scratch that would provide payments for people on low incomes, disabled people, carers, and young people entering the workplace and help people heat their homes. This was not simply ‘lifting and shifting’ a technology estate from the UK Government. Instead, the devolved benefits had to be detached from the UK system, moved onto a new (to be developed) Scottish system, and then connected back into the UK system of reserved benefits to ensure social security functions as seamlessly as possible for clients claiming benefits from both Governments. This is the first time any country has attempted to devolve powers from such an integrated and complex system of social security. Let me take you back to February 2017 when I was tasked with setting up the new digital and technology function from scratch. The race was on to create an entirely new digital capability (systems and people) to support the most significant new public service to be created in Scotland since devolution in 1997. I was conscious that we were laying the foundations for this new public service. A public service that, when fully operational, would be responsible for 20 benefits/payments, 17 of these through Social Security Scotland including seven completely new forms of financial support. Supporting 1.8 million children and adults – around one in three people in Scotland. As this was the first time two governments had shared clients, with people being eligible for payments from both the UK system and Social Security Scotland, and with those payments affecting and, in some cases, interacting with one another, we had to make sure that our systems would work together seamlessly. Doing this would mean that people would get the right money at the right time. Without some of the constraints of legacy issues, we took the opportunity to set up our systems in a way that they could evolve and improve over time. Working with colleagues in the Scottish Government, the approach was to ensure the safe and secure transition of benefits in stages, with Carer’s Allowance Supplement and Best Start Grant Pregnancy and Baby Payment the first two live payments by autumn/winter 2018. " Our digital technology strategy, and in particular our ’secure by design’ approach has been developed to balance the need to protect and ensure the integrity of Social Security Scotland information whilst recognising its unique function in Scotland, acknowledging its desire to develop a service with dignity, fairness and respect as its core " As part of our digital and technology strategy and the foundation pillars of reuse, before buy, before build, we put several technology components in place during 2017 and 2018 which enabled us to deliver safe and secure payments for the first benefits from autumn 2018 onwards. We then focussed on scaling the technology and systems to introduce more capability, to continue to provide a consistent multi-channel experience for our clients and to ensure above all that they are paid on time, every time. Our digital technology strategy, and in particular our ’secure by design’ approach has been developed to balance the need to protect and ensure the integrity of Social Security Scotland information whilst recognising its unique function in Scotland, acknowledging its desire to develop a service with dignity, fairness and respect as its core. Keeping our client’s information safe and secure is at the heart of everything we do. It is imperative that they have trust and confidence in us to process and protect their information in their time of need. We adopted a cloud-first approach and are hosting all our data within secure UK facilities in line with our risk appetite. We have built our cloud environments using automated infrastructure and deploying infrastructure as code, creating a reusable public library of digital assets for other public sector organisations looking to adopt the cloud and deploy rapidly. This innovative approach has accelerated environment builds, reducing deployment time and resource overheads, allowing us to automate usage and billing controls, an important factor in a pay-as-you-use cloud model. Senior digital leaders are dependent on the expertise and skills of our staff who work tirelessly to deliver great results, and in the last few years, the pressure has been even greater as they adapted to an unprecedented global pandemic. We have a highly talented and dedicated group of colleagues within Social Security Scotland who have got us this far on our incredible journey since formation in 2017. Challenges around recruitment continue, in particular finding people with digital skills in areas such as cloud computing and cyber security, but we are making steady progress in this important area. We are now in year five of delivering the digital and technology system for the devolved social security benefits. It has proven to be increasingly complex with fast-paced delivery since our inception. Our technology will continue to evolve over time, and we will continue to engage our clients on this journey, without losing sight of the needs of our users.