NSW works on delivering data-driven government

The New South Wales budget includes $17 million over four years to fund the state government’s Data Analytics Centre.

The NSW government in August last year announced that it would establish the DAC with an eye to promoting data-driven decision making.

In November the government passed enabling legislation creating a streamlined framework for the DAC to obtain data across government agencies. Earlier this year an advisory board for the organisation was appointed, led by ASX chief information officer, Tim Thurman.

“The Data Analytics Centre (DAC) provides a central platform for information sharing and analytics on data from multiple agencies, and works with those agencies to generate solutions,” budget papers state.

“The DAC facilitates data sharing between State Government agencies to inform more efficient, strategic, quicker, evidence based decision making.”

“In a world rich with data, the DAC can diagnose the problems confronting many in government and allow agencies to provide the solutions,” NSW’s innovation and better regulation minister Victor Dominello said in a statement.

The minister has previously said the DAC’s creation could rank as one of his biggest achievements in public life.

According to the government, the DAC has 10 projects underway. They include analysing the callout rate of NSW Fire and Rescue with the intention of identifying false alarms (fire alarms are triggered 48,000 times a year in the Sydney metro area and 97 per cent are false alarms); understanding commuter needs during off-peak travel; identifying buildings at risk from non-compliant cladding; and identifying property overcrowding.

The final update to the NSW government’s current ICT strategy had a focus on boosting the use of data collected by public sector agencies.