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Connected Devolution

Digital systems for successful reorganisation

Category: Devolution & Decentralisation

Author: Callin McLinden   |  

Connected Devolution

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The wave of local government reorganisation (LGR) heralded by the English Devolution Bill represents the most significant structural upheaval outside of central government since the 1970s. The creation of new unitary authorities is designed to increase productivity and streamline governance, to the desired end of providing residents with better quality public services. The logistical challenge of merging multiple district authorities into these new authorities cannot, however, be overstated. This is particularly relevant when considering the need to integrate the multiple back-office technological systems which underpin public service delivery.

If handled well, such integration could reduce costs whilst improving the responsiveness and accessibility of local government systems, making them easier to monitor and manage. Connected Devolution examines the current policy context for technological integration and LGR, drawing on cutting-edge research and best practice examples from home and abroad to produce an analysis of the risks, opportunities and potential ways forward for successful, transformative LGR.

Key points

  • Sub-optimal digital readiness at the local level. The aggregate digital readiness of English local government is held back by pervasive legacy dependency, fragmentation, supplier lock-in, and constrained finances. While national digital ‘rails’ provide useful precedents, they are fundamentally incomplete for the comprehensive integration demands of LGR.
  • Capacity as the binding constraint. The overarching limiting factor is organisational capacity, with only approximately two percent of local authority headcount in digital or data-adjacent roles, significantly frustrating LGR systems integration. This necessitates ring-fenced skills funding and professionalisation against frameworks like the Government Digital and Data Profession Capability Framework.
  • The central role of governance and leadership. LGR outcomes hinge on the nature of the new operating model and how decision-making powers are allocated across the merging entities. Leaders must align political and executive sponsors behind an interface-first vision and adopt a ‘rails-first, interface-led’ strategy to guide convergence. Effective governance must embed cyber and data ethics from the outset.
  • The potential of data integration for prevention. Integrated services become deliverable when data from multiple independent organisations is consolidated into a single, jointly governed analytics “spine”. This is necessary to enable truly preventative services and complex cross-agency care planning.
  • The importance of commercial strategy and risk mitigation. New strategic authorities can leverage their aggregated demand to overcome legacy supplier lock-in and fragmented purchasing. Commercial strategy must actively reduce legacy risk by mandating exit plans, ensuring data portability in open formats, and requiring open, documented API access without prohibitive fees.
  • Collaboration as the operating context. Regional collaboration is no longer optional but must be the fundamental operating context for LGR success, utilising archetypes like networked administrative organisations or community product consortia to pool expertise and standardise assets across local boundaries.

Summary of recommendations

Central government
Area of focus Key recommendations
LGR appraisal & governance Embed ‘rails-first’, interface-led governance requirements into guidance for and appraisal of LGR options.
Mandate cybersecurity and data ethics governance policies as core components of LGR bids.
Make multi-dimensional public value (not just cash savings) the formal test for LGR digital integration.
Treat digital inclusion and affordability as structural conditions of public value, not bolt-on social policy.
Support the inclusion of digital leadership at the executive tier in emerging new unitary authorities.
Capacity and investment Provide revenue support for councils to invest in onboarding capacity, not just platforms themselves.
Underwrite multi-year convergence funding tied to staged milestones as part of the LGR process.
Following on from the policy commitment to develop regional data centres, look to establish regional centres for the development of training and capacity at local authority level.
Standard setting & market shaping Formalise the use of the Government Digital and Data Profession Capability Framework as a mandatory requirement of local governance.
Publish and maintain a national reference architecture for local government core systems.
Use procurement policy notes (PPNs) to set a national commercial baseline that hardwires portability, open standards, and exit rights into contracts.
Issue sector-wide AI procurement and assurance expectations.
Mandate resolution planning, supplier health monitoring, and continuity provisions as standard for local authorities across LGR footprints.
Incentivise the use of shared intelligence infrastructure across the local state to help drive preventative public services.

Strategic authorities
Area of focus Key recommendations
Capacity and professionalisation Help address the capacity gap by acting at subregional level, professionalising roles, creating boundary-spanning posts, and working with suppliers and training providers to develop skills pathways.
Market coherence Seek to coordinate collective bargaining and leverage to attempt to reset market dynamics around openness and portability.
Broker inter-organisational federation beyond local government boundaries, including NHS partners, housing bodies, and other arms of the local state.

New unitaries and other local authorities
Area of focus Key recommendations
Governance and leadership

 

 Embed cybersecurity and data ethics assurance in core governance from day zero.
Publish, maintain, and enforce a one-page decision rights matrix for digital integration.
Ensure digital leaders are part of cabinet-level and chief executive-level decision-making for LGR, giving them a commensurate mandate as whole-systems stewards.
Transition management Produce a single, shared contract map before vesting, and use it to plan novation and exits.
Drive early consolidation of corporate core systems through a disciplined principle of ‘adopt-not-adapt’, then iterate.
Procurement and commercial assurance

 

 

 Treat procurement as portfolio stewardship beyond contract-to-contract decision-making.
Bake portability, security, continuous improvement, and transparency into every major contract, using standard schedules by default.
Implement supplier health and resolution planning up front.
Govern AI and advanced analytics as part of mainstream commercial assurance.
Public value and inclusion

 

 Own the benefits management of digital procurement and ensure the story is meaningful to residents.
Treat inclusion and assisted access as core principles of a safe service.
Treat digital integration as a public-facing reform and embed ethical transparency and resident legitimacy into programme governance.
Sector-wide efficiency

 

 Follow the adopt-not-adapt principle for core ERP and line-of-business platforms.
Plug into national/regional registers and services wherever they exist, instead of rebuilding core reference data locally.
Collaborate horizontally with neighbouring authorities to standardise interfaces and workflows.

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