Downing Street to axe 'hundreds' of government web sites

The government is cracking down on wasteful spending in all areas

The government has announced plans to close "hundreds of unnecessary web sites" and cut costs on the rest in a bid to save millions of pounds.

There are currently 820 government sites, according to official figures, and a report by the Spending Review due in September is expected to recommend closing 75 per cent of them.

The remaining sites will be asked to cut costs by up to 50 per cent, and investigate "using low-cost open source products to reduce running costs".

No new sites will be permitted except those cleared by the Efficiency Board, which is co-chaired by Francis Maude, minister for the Cabinet Office, and Danny Alexander, chief secretary to the Treasury.

The efficiency drive follows a pledge in 2006 by the last government to cut its expenditure on web sites, which saw 1,001 out of 1,795 sites closed by March 2010.

Despite these cuts, a report published today by the Central Office for Information found that £94m has been spent across government on the construction, set up and running costs of 46 web sites, and £32m on staff costs for those sites, in 2009-10. One web site, uktradeinvest.gov.uk, was found to cost £11.78 per visit.

Maude claimed that the new administration is committed to "getting the government web back under control".

"The days of 'vanity' sites are over. It is not good enough to have web sites which do not deliver the high-quality services people expect and deserve," he added.

"That is why we will take tough action to get rid of those which are not up to the job and do not offer good value for money, and introduce strict guidelines for those that remain."

Today's announcement follows Tuesday's emergency Budget which has pledged to eliminate the UK's deficit within the lifetime of one parliament. The Budget was generally well received by IT experts and industry groups.

Measures include scrapping the planned rise in employer National Insurance contributions, reducing corporation tax by one per cent every year, and abolishing a planned 50p landline tax to fund broadband in rural areas.