Government Departments: ICT
The question
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what assessment he has made of the dependency of government departments and agencies on IT systems provided by (a) Microsoft and (b) Google; and whether the Government is contracted to those suppliers.
Answered by Chris Ward
IT procurement is devolved to individual departments, meaning the Government does not hold a single, aggregated dependency assessment. However, to mitigate supply chain risks and avoid single-supplier dependence, we actively work to diversify our technology estate.
The Government Commercial Agency (GCA) manages the Strategic Partnership Arrangement 2024 (SPA24) with Microsoft. This is a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to secure preferential pricing for public bodies, rather than a central contract committing to a specific spend. Google Cloud is being integrated into the government technology landscape as part of our strategy to enhance service resilience and reduce reliance on a single provider.
Wider initiatives are outlined in the Roadmap for Modern Digital Government: https://roadmap-for-modern-digital-government.campaign.gov.uk/.
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