An overwhelming number of councils are not buying their IT services through the government’s much-trumpeted G-Cloud, according to a Freedom of Information request.
A total of 87% of councils and local authorities are failing to use the cloud platform despite its alleged benefits, revealed the FoI data from Six Degrees Group, a managed data service provider which is signed up to G-Cloud.
The latest version, G-Cloud 4, went live at the end of October, and the service was lauded as a way to level the playing field and offer SMBs more exposure to bid for public sector deals, with councils and public bodies able to put contracts out to tender and get more competitive rates on IaaS, PaaS, SaaS and SCS services.
But Six Degrees Group’s data suggests that despite there being more than 1,000 firms using the platform, only 38 of 300 councils were procuring any services from it.
The company’s group strategy director, Campbell Williams, called on the government to better advertise G-Cloud to increase its usage, claiming there is a "communication issue".
"Cloud services have the potential to be revolutionary for the public sector and G-Cloud is a framework specifically intended to make sourcing these services simple," he added.
"However it’s clearly not doing its job for a huge number of councils and local authorities in the UK, which could otherwise be benefitting from the expenditure savings, innovations, agility and security of cloud computing.
"We’re disappointed that G-Cloud is still failing both customers and suppliers alike."
CBR has approached the Cabinet Office for comment.
