Resourcing OPSI, a part of the National Archives

The government should ensure that the public sector makes the best use of scarce talent and expertise while it is upskilling to take advantage of the power of information.  This work is at the leading edge for any public sector and skills are in short supply.

The public sector will need to resource and use world class centres of excellence such as OPSI, a part of National Archives, carefully to avoid both wasteful duplication and missed opportuities to tap their expertise.  Things that can be done once for the whole of government should only be done once, in line with the Transformational Government strategy.  The more resources for instance OPSI has, the more efficient it can be in providing a shared service for government as a whole.  OPSI’s running costs of £1.04m per annum, reported in the United Kingdom Report on the Re-Use of Public Sector Information 2008 (Cm 7446) are modest compared to the £205m annual running costs of central government web operations estimated by the NAO. However as is often the case in the public sector, the costs and benefits fall to different organisations.