ODI Friday Lunchtime Lecture

8 January 2016
Paul Maltby
Director of Data
Government Digital Service
@maltbyps

In the last Parliament our data

approach was dominated by
open data

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We did okay

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The data user community

worked wonders

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Now we need to focus on

quality, not just quantity

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Driving data quality by dogfooding within government

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And concentrating on shared

data, not just open data

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We have a new Government

Data Programme aiming to
transform how data is used
across public services

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Too much government data is

Duplicated
In many different formats
Hard to reach
Hard to maintain
Hard to put to good use

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Our aim = better digital services

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Our aim = good policy and

operational decisions

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Our aim = economic benefits

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Our aim = public trust & security

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The Government Data

Programme has 3 workstreams

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1. Better use of data

Open data
Data Science
Data literacy and capability

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@cgchristrott
Consul General, Cape Town, SA

Data science opportunities:

Unstructured data and
visualisations
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Data science opportunities:

Clustering and prediction
Data Science & the Civil Service

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There is some unfinished

business on open data

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We want to maintain input

from external users to keep
driving the open data agenda

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Creating mainstream data

science capability among
analysts in government, with
ONS

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GDS will be supporting this,

including through data literacy
for non-data specialists

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2. Modernising data
infrastructure
Registers
APIs
Data access tools

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companies, charities, trade unions, courts, schools,

universities, hospitals, zoos, circuses, inspections,
licences, certificates, births, marriages, deaths,
electoral roll, insolvencies, bankruptcies, passports,
animal passports, drivers, vehicles, land parcels,
land ownership, land use, legal boundaries, awards,
tax rates, benefits, livestock movements, flood risk,
river levels, companies, fish caught, patents,
trademarks, designs, non-native invasive plants,
bank holidays, food standards, clock changes
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SCOLAND UK
SCOTALND UK
SCOTKLAND UK
SCOTLAD UK
SCOTLAND
SCOTLAND UK
SCOTLAND UK
SCOTLAND UNITED KINGDO
SCOTLAND UNITED KINGDOM
SCOTLAND UNITED KINGODM
SCOTLAND, UK
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Registers are more than just a list

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 Persistent & canonical

Minimum viable dataset
A service, not a list
Integrity of history
Open / shared / private

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Starting with commonly

referenced registers such as
Countries
Companies (limited companies,
charities, sole traders)
Local authorities
Schools
Addresses
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Creating an API infrastructure

across government and, where
appropriate, to users outside

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Reducing the need for bulk

data sharing in government

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Moving away from

downloading and emailing data
around Whitehall

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And disks in the post

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(but we know how important

bulk availability of data is for
some external users via data.
gov.uk)

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Were also starting to think

about better data discovery
tools - both inside and outside
government

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There are currently no tools for

civil servants to know whether
non-open data exists across
government

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Never mind knowing whether

they can or should access it

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Or having tools available to

help them query the data or
provide basic manipulation, eg
plot on a map

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A discovery process on tooling

will start soon - we will be
doing user research with users
inside and outside government

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3. Data policy and governance

Common policies and leadership
Possible legislation
International leadership

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A new Ministerial Group on

Digital Transformation including data

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An external Steering Group

chaired by National Statistician
John Pullinger
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Open Data Institute keeping

our feet to the fire and
connected with external data
users
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At the heart of the programme

senior Data Leaders drawn from
across government

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Agreeing:
Common policies (eg external sharing)
Data standards
Responsibility for registers
Opportunities for collaboration
And leading the new data vision
across Whitehall
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Possible new data access

legislation?
Research and
statistics
HMRC
ADRNs
ONS admin data

Tailored public
services
Personal data for
defined & limited
individual benefit

Fraud
Personal data for
tackling fraud
(with sunset
clause)

See more on the earlier open policy process with civil society at datasharing.org.uk

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Data science ethical framework

1
2
3
4
5
6

Start with clear user need and public benefit

Use data and tools which have the minimum
intrusion necessary

Create robust data science models

Be alert to public perceptions

Be as open as possible

Keep data secure

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Better use of data

Open data
Data Science
Data literacy and capability

Modernising data infrastructure

Data discovery tools
APIs
Registers

Data policy and governance

Common policies and leadership
Possible legislation
International leadership

Your collaboration priorities?

Data infrastructure (registers/APIs)

Input to discovery for data discovery tools
Prioritising requests for open data target datasets
How to develop engagement process with the
whole community
Shared data and appropriate rules of the road
Data science ethics framework
[Data access legislation - via Involve sessions]
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Paul Maltby
Director of Data
Government Digital Service
@maltbyps