Government to commission design through ‘hubs’ as COI is wound down

The Government has unveiled plans for a series of cross-departmental hubs that will be involved in commissioning design, as it confirmed that the Central Office of Information is to be wound down by the end of next March.

The Cabinet Office announced its intention to scrap the COI in June, when plans were mooted for a series of marketing hubs as well as a Communications Delivery Board.

The first three hubs have now been confirmed. Hub one comprises the Department for Communities and Local Government, the Department of Energy and Climate Change, the Department for Transport and the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.

Hub two comprises the Home Office and the Ministry of Justice while hub three is the Department of Health.

A Cabinet Office spokesman says there are plans for further hubs to look at sectors such as culture.

The spokesman says that while some COI services, such as media monitoring, will be taken over by the Government’s shared delivery pool, design commissioning ‘would most likely live within the hubs’.

Current COI frameworks will now pass to the Government Procurement Service, the spokesman adds, and as their terms conclude plans to replace them will be worked up, with the hubs feeding into this process.

Jenny Grey, director of policy and communications for the Cabinet Office, is to manage the the transition to the hub structure in a new role as acting executive director for Government communications.

The spokesman says the move is ‘all about looking at how to best use the resources we have available’.

He cited the cross-departmental delivery of Mother’s Great Britain brand campaign as ‘absolutely’ an indication of the way design and marketing work might be commissioned and delivered in the future.

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