Across all of the many federal departments and agencies, is there a technology shop more unusual than that of the Department of Parliamentary Services?
For a start, Parliamentary Services sits outside of the structures that support the Australia government. Its leaders do not report to government though a minister, but are instead responsible to the Presiding Officers – that is, the Speaker of the House and the Senate President.
Its loyalties and its services are delivered to those two chambers, keeping the wheels of the democratic process on the road and running smoothly. And this is what attracted the department’s chief information officer Mike Webb to the role, the unique contribution that its tech services provide to the nation.
In this episode of Discovery: A GovTech Podcast, Mike Webb takes us through some of the unique challenges of the organisation, and how that translates to dealing with suppliers and with new technology.
Parliamentary Services does lean on some of the whole-of-government principles and methodologies from the Public Service. But there is a clear separation from the APS and government. The department is governed by a separate Act of Parliament.
The name of the organisation suggests a centralised operation within one building in Canberra. But in fact, it supports perhaps the most geographically dispersed operation of any organisation of its size in the country.
“There’s 226 parliamentarians, but there are 270 electoral offices around the country,” Mr Webb says.
Each parliamentarian and their electorate office operates like a small business, such that Parliamentary Services’ tech operation is providing technology services across the country, in addition to supporting and securing the operation of the two chambers.
That includes the broadcasting services, Hansard and the live parliamentary website, the voting systems in the Chambers, the parliamentary library among a broad variety of other tech.
“We also have a reasonable tech presence here in the building,” Mr Webb says. “We have some sophisticated electronic security systems. We have systems that help with catering. We do the cafes, we do the gym, facilitating tours, all of those kinds of things. The infrastructure is quite broad.”
“I put my hand up for this role because the privilege of working here in Parliament House, supporting our democratic processes,” he said. “The value you bring as an IT leader is really about tailoring IT to the specific needs of the organisation, rather than IT for IT sake.
“And so understanding the business, contextualising it to the specific services, is a real interest of mine.”
If you are a technology supplier to the public sector and had planned to approach Parliamentary Services with your product, there is some good context in this interview on where the organisation has focused its attention and where its biggest challenges are.
Do you know more? Contact James Riley via Email.