5th March 2025
The state of digital government: what’s holding the UK back?
The UK public sector holds extensive digital resources, investing over £26 billion annually in digital technology and employing nearly 100,000 digital and data professionals. Every day, it facilitates millions of online transactions, supporting essential services across the country. These digital resources are crucial for millions of people, helping them access vital services from their local councils, hospitals, schools and beyond. This technology has a real, everyday impact, supporting people’s lives and citizens across the country.
However, to build a truly modern digital government and transform public services, much more remains to be done, as highlighted by the statistics in The State of Digital Government Review (2025). Did you know...
- UK public services lag in digitisation. What percentage of UK public services are digital?
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Under 50% of UK public services have a digital channel, compared to 99% in Estonia.
- Citizens expect more. How satisfied is the UK population with public digital services?
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With citizens spending 1.5 weeks annually on government bureaucracy, UK satisfaction with public digital services has dropped from 79% to 68% in the last decade.
- British public sector doesn’t spend enough on technology. How does UK public sector tech spending compare to peers?
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In 2023, UK public sector tech spend was £26bn. However, digital and data spending per FTE is 78% lower than peer benchmarks. Local government spends just 4.9% of operating expenses on Digital & Data, below the 7% benchmark.
- Public sector productivity has fallen. What savings could digitisation unlock for the UK?
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Full digitisation could save the UK public sector over £45bn in unrealised savings and productivity benefits annually, representing 4-7% of public sector spending.
- Public sector technology is fragmented and duplicative. How fragmented is the UK public sector's technology landscape?
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NHS England uses 50 CRM platforms, and a 2023 review found 190 different authorisation services in use across the government.
- Fragmented, underused data limits AI potential. How well is data managed across the public sector?
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70% of respondents say data is poorly coordinated or lacks a unified source of truth. A survey of 76 local authorities found ‘data management’ scored lowest for maturity.
- Critical services depend on decades old legacy technology. What are the costs of maintaining legacy systems?
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Maintaining legacy systems costs 3–4 times more than modern alternatives. While legacy estates make up 28% of central government, legacy levels in police forces and NHS trusts can reach up to 70%.
- Service reliability is too low, while cyber risk is critically high. How resilient was public sector digital infrastructure in 2024?
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In 2024, 25% of respondents reported critical outages, including 123 in NHS England alone. The National Cyber Security Centre faced 50% more nationally significant incidents, with a threefold increase in severity.
- Cloud adoption is concentrated in central government. What is cloud adoption across other public sector areas?
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While 55% of central government organisations have over 60% of their estate on the cloud, cloud adoption lags in other public sector areas, with legacy estates in police forces and NHS trusts ranging from 10% to 70%, and much of local government still reliant on on-premise infrastructure.
- Funding models do not reflect modern digital practice. How many councils have dedicated budgets for new digital systems?
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65% of digital leaders say the funding models fail to support effective digital investment and operations, with only 39% of councils having dedicated budgets for new systems, and less than 50% of 2024 digital and data spending classified as opex, well below Gartner’s 78% benchmark.
- The public sector lacks digital and data professionals and struggles to attract top talent. What is the pay gap between public and private sector tech roles?
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In local government, digital and data roles make up just 2% of headcount, compared to the 4% benchmark, with a 35% pay gap (or £30k annually) between private and public sector technical architects.
Civica, as the UK’s #1 provider of public sector software, is here to help tackle the digital challenges affecting government services. By modernising outdated systems, integrating fragmented platforms and improving data flow, Civica can make services faster and more reliable, directly improving citizens’ daily lives. We can help save billions through smarter, more efficient technology, which can be reinvested into vital services like healthcare and education. With a focus on cloud adoption and secure, scalable solutions, we can reduce risks and ensure public services meet the growing expectations of citizens, delivering the seamless and trustworthy experiences they deserve. The future is digital.