[ColinHayhurst]

Exactly, through recall this was Conservative and Liberal Democrat coalition government, so Nick Clegg (you might have head of him) may have a claim.

Actually the credit should go to the brilliant and dedicated people in GDS doing great work; though I do not know enough to pick out names. The UI/UX and implementation was first class from the get go.

As a Brit my life is made remarkably easier as a citizen and startup entrepreneur. The benefits to the UK ecomnomy are enorous but not measured. In contrast my personal experience of govt engagement when setting-up and running startups in US between 1991 and 2013 were painful. And would have been very painful without help (thank you YC).

Finally if we are going to give leadership credit it should go to Francis Maude [0]. He happened to be my local MP, so I met him quite a few times, and he was most helpful and astonishingly effective in helping us navigate two big challenges we had in facing down, shall we say, "unethical quango-business partnerships". A remarkable, thoughtful man and effective operator, who was in government over three decades [1].

[0] https://gds.blog.gov.uk/2012/10/16/gov-uk-the-start/ [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Maude

[gm3dmo]

+1 for Francis Maude because he definitely grokked it.

Martha Lane Fox also deserves mention for: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/directgov-2010-an...

They all tore up the rulebook. The rule being: Government can’t do computers. Outsource to favourite big consultancy. Twenty years were wasted on that nonsense approach.

Some of the greatest resistance comes from the big departments who are actively hostile to many of the changes required to work in this way. There’s a lot to be said for a round of golf at The Belfry with the splendid chaps from the IT consultancy your department spends £2bn a year with.

Golf days: https://parliamentlive.tv/event/index/abfe49d3-f24c-4b93-b8e...