The National Audit Office has published 'Challenges in using data across
government' aimed at accounting officers, chief
executives, director generals, directors and chief operating
officers and people responsible for government services.
Background to the report
Government wants more effective use of data and data-sharing
across public services. Data is government’s biggest asset and it
is critically important to improve data to be able to share it
better and exploit its benefits. But for established
organisations, these benefits are not simple to achieve in
practice.
Scope of the report
This guide is for senior leaders responsible for delivering
government services. Our aim is to encourage decision‑makers
to realise the benefits of better use of data by helping them
understand in more detail the core issues to be addressed which
have held back progress in the past.
We focus on data to support the operational delivery of public
services, but much of our guide will also be relevant to data for
decision-making and to improve performance.
Our guide discusses overcoming barriers in data sharing, data
quality, data standards, resourcing, access to raw data and APIs
(application programming interfaces), creating
cross-government data sets for multiple users, data analytics.
We also look at ways forward including: reviewing why initiatives
have failed in the past, embedding data standards, improving
data quality, addressing legacy issues, enabling data-sharing.
