ICT & Business Support Development Plan

AGENDA ITEM 4

BOROUGH OF POOLE

CABINET

256 APRIL 2006

ICT INVESTMENT AND DEVELOPMENT PLAN 2006-2007

PART OF THE PUBLISHED FORWARD PLAN – YES

STATUS – STRATEGIC POLICY

1. Purpose of the Report

1.1To consider the Information Communication Technology Investment and Development Plans for 2006/2007.

2. Decisions Required

The Cabinet are asked to;

2.1Agree that £500,000 be committed from the resources approved for ICT Infrastructure in the Medium Term Financial Plan by Council for 2006/2007 in order to deliver the works identified as priority in the ICT Investment Plan for 2006/2007.

2.2Agree the content and governance arrangements for the ICT Development plan for 2006 to 2007.

3.Background

3.1At its meeting on 7th February 2006 the Cabinet allocated £500,000 per annum to the ICT Investment plan as part of the medium term financial plan. Additionally £100,000 of previously unallocated funds remain available.

3.2At its meeting on 29th March 2006 the ICT Steering Group agreed to the content and approach in formulation of the ICT Development plan for 2006/2007.

3.3The 2005/2006 Investment and Development plans are near to completion with 70% of all works completed and the remaining 30% due to complete within agreed timescales over the coming months. Key benefits and achievements to highlight are;

  • Expanded on-line services – Such as “Where can I find?” Which enables citizens and staff to view spatial data via the website as well as Planning applications, e-payments in “Pay for it” and “Apply for it”, council tax and business rates
  • CRM, Customers First – Procurement, installation and integration of a CRM system and the phase A services.
  • Upgrade to corporate email – Phase one and two covering research design and implementation of email quotas and an anti-spam solution.

3.4In preparing the 2006/2007 ICT Investment & Development plans officers are concerned to:

  1. Take into account work which commenced as part of the critical path for 2005/2006 infrastructure changes and complete these in line with agreed timetables.
  2. Completion of works such as document management and authentication which make up the remainder of the authority’s e-Government programme.
  3. Attribute an appropriate level of priority to infrastructure works which are required to reduce operational risk, enable equity of service delivery and choice and will support future service efficiency and innovation.
  4. Ensure that plans for specific developments proposed by Service Units are researched and assessed against clear set of priorities which support the Corporate aims and objectives, OPDM Priority outcomes or other government requirements and critical business need. As well as an appropriate funding source to optimise delivery of the works.

3.5In terms of output officers are working to a 1 to 3 month fixed schedule of work which addresses the immediate priorities of the development plan. Beyond the three months the development plan will have more flexibility included in it to reflect the changing needs of the business. The immediate and firm demands are governed by a rigorous Change Control process. This is to ensure that any changes to the development plan in the short term have been impact assessed against the overall Council objectives. This approach has been well received and it is proposed this continues at the three levels set out below;

  1. Low impact change to be assessed by the Programme Manager
  2. Medium impact change to assessed and approved by the Head of ICT & Business Support.
  3. High impact and high risk change to be agreed by the ICT Steering Group.

3.6In this context officers have brought forward a development and investment plan which deals with the concerns in 3.4. Details of the ICT Investment Plan are available in appendix A and details of the ICT Development plan are available in appendix B

4.The proposal for Corporate & Service Unit Developments for 2006/2007

4.1The Development Plan for 2005/06 was influenced by the need for ICT to carry out a number of fundamental tasks to improve components of the infrastructure. In response to this it is recommended that the first half of the Development Plan for 2006/07 is primarily Service Unit facing. These developments include but are not limited to;

  1. Customers First - Phase B begins in March 2006 with an expected live date of October 2006. This will see the transfer the next set of services to the contact centre requiring the integration of Academy Council Tax and Non Domestic Rates, Electronic Document Management (EDM) Anite @ work and electronic forms to Lagan CRM. It will also require the sourcing, design and implementation of data encryption and customer authentication tools. Further investigation and development work around the self service portal, middleware are also on the agenda with Phase c systems evaluation due towards the end of the year.
  2. Bop.com - Hosted internally but largely designed by external support this award winning site is at a cross roads in its development. Major works such as replacement of Content Management System, resolution of hosting requirements, retention of ‘T’ status and building in capacity to deal with the channel shift strategy are vital to its continuing success.
  3. E-Admissions – The completion of the testing and final implementation phase for a system to support the submission of on-line applications for school admissions and transfers. This is required to meet the central government target for LEA’s to provide this facility by September 2006.
  4. Fleet Management – Procurement and implementation of a system to manage the fleet refuse and cleansing vehicles. Replacement of the current spreadsheet system will offer greater time efficiency and improved management reporting and cost analysis.

5.The proposal for Infrastructure Projects for 2006/2007

5.1Infrastructure improvement during the first part of the year will come from the completion of works started as part of the 2005/2006 plan such as email archiving. A level of priority and urgency had been given to those works which will reduce risk, promote equity of service and support future service requirements these works include but are not limited to;

  1. Application Delivery – Upgrade of the current version Citrix which will not be supported by the vendor from December 2006. This also provides an opportunity to take advantage of additional functionality such as improved performance and support for remote printing.
  2. SQL – Expansion and introduction of resilience into the corporate database platform to remove single points of failure and to provide secure effective management of the 30 business applications running in this environment.
  3. Firewall – Upgrade and health check of the corporate firewalls to support mobile working and reduce the risk of intrusion to the corporate network.
  4. Library connections – Improvements in the network connectivity of the central and branch libraries to enable the delivery of services via thin client and support the customer access strategy.

5.2It is not practical to deliver all the schemes set out in the plan due to limited resources and capacity. With this in mind attention will be focused on the A and B priority works. The plan will be subject to variation, and as a consequence it is recommended that within the financial resources available that the Head of ICT and Business Support (in consultation with the ICT Steering Group) be given delegated authority to reprioritise schemes.

5.3Total funding required for Priorities A and B total £695,000 which is £95,000 above the resources available for 2006/2007. However these estimates are considered prudent and Officers will be required to fully research each scheme which will only be progressed once supported by a robust business case. In all likelyhood this process will reduce the estimates, however should this not be the case then schemes will be deferred into 2007/08 and act as first priority’s against the £500,000 allocated for 2007/08 as part of the Medium Term Financial Plan.

5.4Those schemes attributed a C and E priority provide an opportunity to illustrate longer term planning and are likely to feature as a higher priority in the 2007/2008 investment plan.

KATIE LACEY

Head of ICT & Business Support

Background Papers

ICT Development Plan 2006/2007 – REPORT TO ICT Steering group 29th March 2006 – Katie Lacey

Name & Telephone number of Officer Contact

Katie Lacey, 01202 6331866th April 2006

Appendix A

Item / Description & Risk mitigation / Sub-Totals
Priority A
Robust & scalable SQL Node solution / Design procurement and installation of a robust and scaleable solution for the authorities Microsoft SQL server.. Expansion and increasing reliance on this preferred platform is in line with the Corporate ICT Strategy. To support this into the coming years there is a need to remove single points of failure and ensure effective management of over 30 applications databases running in this environment. / 57,000
Application Delivery Infrastructure Upgrade including Application License control / Design, proof of concept, procurement, regression testing and migration from CITRIX Metaframe XPE to version 4.0. The XPE version will become unsupported in December 2006 upgrading is required to ensure support and stability of the authorities thin client server farm which delivers core applications to 1200 users and take advantage of additional functionality offered by the new version. / 187,000
Firewall Health check, upgrade & penetration testing / Software upgrade of the Corporate firewalls is required to support increase in use of Mobile Working and the use of point to point Virtual Private Network(VPN) connectivity. Work will include a heath check of rule base and policies to eliminate and mitigate risk of intrusion onto the Authorities network. / 17,000
Server Replacement Strategy / Recommendation to implement 3 year Microsoft server replacement strategy and 5 year SUN Strategy. Funds support replacement of 30 servers currently past their end of life running on the thin client server farm, Olasftp, firewalls, Loop, Flare and Axis. Additionally research into the benefits of incorporating Blade technology and virtualisation of the Server environment to minimise future total cost of ownership. / 75,000
Sub-total / £336,000
Priority B
Improving library network connectivity to BoP architecture / Design, procurement and installation of network infrastructure for central and branch libraries to bring these connections to the same level of connectivity as other sites and enable the provision of services via thin client, mobility and support the customer access strategy for face to face services. / 130,000
Schools Admin ICT infrastructure / The current version of email provided for schools is now unsupported by the vendor and requires either upgrade or removal as it cannot indefinitely co-exist with the latest version of the corporate email service. This presents an opportunity to investigate delivery of a centrally managed service, negating the need for independent servers at schools extending the scope of thin client services and improving service delivery. Initial investigation is underway to gauge potential buy in from schools before development of any preferred service delivery option. / 110,000
Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery / Soft estimate for the investigation and identification of single points of failure across the ICT infrastructure. Output will be a report with costed options and an action plan to eliminate or mitigate risks presented. Decisions taken to support the recommendations will be in consultation with the corporate business continuity planning group. / 10,000
ICT UPS Replacement / Funds to procure alternative power source for the authorities main server room in the form of battery power to deliver 4 hours uptime. This will require significantly larger accommodation than is currently utilised and its requirement is entirely dependant on the outcome of the generator review being conducted by property services. / 62,000
Remote & Mobile working including 2nd point for SSL and increased capacity of concurrent users. / Soft estimate for funds to ensure that corporate infrastructure support is adequate to meet the needs of front line service units for remote access to network and mobile working solutions. This work shares a dependency with formulation of a corporate mobile working strategy. / 15,000
Availability and Capacity planning for internally hosting Bop.com / Design, procurement and implementation of a robust hosting solution for the Authorities award winning website. To support the channel shift strategy there is an increased dependency in this resource for delivery of transactional services, the availability and capacity of this service needs to meet those service needs. The need for this expenditure is entirely dependant on the research and decision to either continue hosting the site internally or outsource this service. (Carried 15,000 forward from previous infrastructure plan) / 15,000
e-GIF Compliance / Training required for relevant ICT Staff to gain the relevant skill and knowledge to ensure that all in-house development, integration and system design work conforms with the Government interoperability framework and standards. / 5,000
ITIL Framework process support / Executing internal action plan to implement control aspects of ICT service support and service delivery will continue to reduce operational risk to the Authority. Incident Management and Change control already implemented. / 10,000
Systems availability and support model / Exercise to investigate active systems monitoring tools and techniques for the main ICT Server room. Work includes estimating the impact of providing physical support for systems over a greater time period than currently provided. / 2,000
Sub-Total / £359,000
Priority C1 and C2
Additional Websense functionality / Implementation of additional functionality of the software which provides protection for staff using the internet against access to inappropriate sites. Expansion required to provide this support for remote and mobile workers and reduce the risk of internet based virus threats. / 22,000
Automatic Account Creation / Support for the design, implementation and testing of using Active Directory to automatically administer and manage the creation of ICT user accounts, using this information as a primary source of user data and access rights to feed other corporate system such as telephone contacts and e-authorise. (Carried 25,000 forward from previous infrastructure plan) / 25,000
Transferring Idocs to SAN / Soft estimate for resource implication of replacing six end of live server running the corporate document management system and moving data stored to the corporate storage area network (SAN). / 30,000
Wireless network / Depending on Service Unit requirement for Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) applications will drive the need for corporate Wireless network. Current business driver comes from Library network and the need to expand use of Civic Centre open working spaces. There is a dependency on development and agreement of a Corporate mobile working strategy. / 25,000
Middleware investigation/ Integration strategy / To support the growth of integration with CRM, this will mitigate the risk of inter-operability shortfalls of legacy systems by introducing a conversational layer facilitating data transfer. / 10,000
Point to Point VPN over the internet / Management of bandwidth to support anticipated growth in site to site VPN and hosted applications / 5,000
Sub-Total / £117,000
Priority E
Office 2007 / Open Office migration investigation / Research into possible migration paths for an upgrade of the office utilities used on the desktop to inform Development plan for 2007/08 / 5,000
Sub-Total / £5,000
Priority A & B Total / £695,000
Priority C and E Total / £122,000
Total / £817,000

Funds Available

Previously unallocated funds / 100,000
Agreed 2006/2007 funds / 500,000
Total Funds Available / 600,000

Appendix B

ICT & Business Support Development Plan 2006/2007

For ICT Steering Group

Author:Andrew Milner

Version:0.3

Date:6th April 2006

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ICT & Business Support Development Plan

Distribution List

Recipient / Action Required

Name

Katie Lacey, Head of ICT & Business Support / Review & Acceptance
Mike Hiscock, Infrastructure Manager, ICT & Business Support / Review
Simon Rees, Customer Services Manager, ICT & Business Support / Review

Document Amendment History

Issue No / Date / Author / Changes
0.1 / 16/03/2006 / A Milner / Draft for review
0.2 / 22/3/2006 / A Milner / Following 1-2-1 feedback from K Lacey. Added 1.4 Summary of old plan, changed order and made cosmetic typing changes required. Removed spurious Development Plan costs table
0.3 / 06/03/06 / K.Lacey / Updated costs section for cabinet report

Contacts

Name / Responsibility / Phone / e-mail
Andrew Milner / Programme Manager / 01202 633341 /

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ICT & Business Support Development Plan

Table of Contents

1Summary

1.1Objectives and Requirements Upon ICT & Business Support

1.2ICT & Business Support Proposition

1.3Summary Estimates

1.4Summary View of 2005/06 Development Plan

1.5Proposed Next Steps

2Development Plan Detail

2.1Objectives

2.2Approach

2.3Organisational Structure

2.4Stakeholder Management

2.5Methodology

2.6Projected milestones

2.7Management Control Structure

3Cost Breakdown......

3.1Draft Infrastructure Costs – Summary view

3.2Draft Infrastructure Costs – Detailed view

3.3Key Risks, Assumptions, Issues and Dependencies identified

4Development requirements gathered

4.1Initiatives requiring urgent progress

4.2Initiatives at lower priority

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ICT & Business Support Development Plan

Summary

ICT & Business Support have taken input from Service Units, directly through the IT Business Needs tool available on the LOOP, change requests to the existing development plan and indirectly through Research Requests gathered through the ICT & Business Support Account Management function. These inputs have been assessed against the corporate and legislative needs to produce a prioritised development plan for 2006/07. In order to deliver against the plan it is necessary for ICT & Business Support to commit resource to develop the ICT infrastructure to support the anticipated growth in use of ICT systems and services.

Objectives and Requirements Upon ICT & Business Support

ICT must provide a telephony system to meet the demands of the business priorities

ICT must provide network and sever infrastructure to meet the needs of the business requirements for change

ICT must provide operational support as detailed in Service Level Agreements for individual Service Units.