I met BT's Dr. Joe Walsh at its in Newgate Street offices to discuss the announcement of investment in super-fast (fibre) network, Newham's Telecoms Convergence Programme and development of London and national Public Services Network. Detailed plans for the BT development won't be available until the end of the year but Joe accepted an invitation to attend a Socitm Futures meeting to discuss the objectives, and we agreed to stay in-touch as our respective plans progress. He is aware, of course, of the BT contract, through TfL, to establish London Public Services Network needs, concerning which I have another meeting on Friday.


Afterwards I met-up with Adrian Hancock and Bernard Gudgin, the author of proposals on Socitm professional development, for a quick pre-meet over lunch, before meeting at the BCS's Southampton Street offices with its Chief Executive, David Clarke, and Cliff Lineker, Strategic Business Development Executive for discussions on collaboration.

In connection with the Chartered IT Professional programme, David explained the lengthy process, to be voted on by the BCS membership in October prior to seeking Privy Council approval for the licensing the award of CITP status by other professional organisations. It's expected this process will be completed by the end of the year. The IET (Institution of Electrical Engineering & Technology) will be first in the queue, but it's expected the BCS will also be in a position to license Socitm thereafter. An independent register will be run by the Engineering Council.

Other discussions concerned nomination of Socitm to membership of the Professionalism in IT Alliance, and of the BCS Government Relations Group. BCS International Developments were outlined, although details of a new partnership programme are currently "under wraps" pending an announcement in 6-8 weeks. Socitm will invite the new BCS International Director to the upcoming LOLA International Conference for discussions.

Adrian and I found the discussion of events management to be particularly illuminating, which helped to clarify our views on future Socitm Events Management.

Bernard will be joining us as an advisor at Thursday's Board meeting, and will continue to help and advise on professional development and the new membership model.


We finished fairly, so I set-off home intending to seize the opportunity of tackling my growing backlog of work, but was thwarted, in this objective, by the closure of the Dartford Bridge because some scaffolding had not been put-up properly, resulting in grid-lock for miles around, and a three hour journey. Having finally made it to the other side, how thrilled I was to queue again to pay a toll to these denizens of public service!