Image source: Digital Poverty Alliance
Interview: Elizabeth Anderson, CEO of the Digital Poverty Alliance, outlines its priorities, the role of government and need for innovation on the issue
This month’s news of measures to mitigate the effect of the digital switchover on telecare was trumpeted as a success by the Government; but it left Elizabeth Anderson with reservations.
The CEO of the Digital Poverty Alliance (DPA) – a charity for building digital inclusion across the UK – said the pledges of telecoms operators to protect vulnerable people using safety alarms in their homes as the public switched telephone network (PSTN) is replaced by digital lines do not go far enough.
A lot of this is down to poor communications.
Meaningless terms
“People don’t understand what they are being sold,” Anderson says. “Full fibre, gigabits and upload speeds are often meaningless terms if you are an older person being told you have to pay for something new.
“We welcome DSIT’s (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology) intervention and focus on improving broadband connectivity across the UK, and their role in bringing together leading telecoms players to shape the future of accessibility.
“However, more broadly, there are still so many confusing messages for customers who may not fully understand the impact of the switchover. To complicate it further, customer facing staff are often not trained to talk to vulnerable customers in simple language that makes sense to them.
“We need to use this as an opportunity to provide skills and resilience. The paid engineer visit on migration is all well and good, but while to most people it’s second nature to ‘turn it off and on again’, this is not something lots of older people previously have needed to do. They won’t know they need to keep a mobile charged that they never use.
“If this is going to be mandated, we have to show people what to do and help them.”
Centralise the effort
She says this creates the need for a central effort, possibly which DSIT delegates to another organisation to manage at a national level, taking in telecoms and telecare providers, local authorities, charities and healthcare trusts.
A big element of this would be training for people who deal with elderly and vulnerable members of the public in language they understand.
“If you are going to be providing support en masse you need to recognise the language that will resonate with the people you are talking to, and a specific style of talking people through what will be very alien to them,” she says.
This is an important issue within the wider purpose of the DPA, which has a focus on policy, collecting evidence and advocacy aimed at ending digital poverty by 2030. It is an issue that resonates with many public sector organisations, especially in local government and healthcare, where the case for a widespread move to digital channels is hindered by the fact that many people lack the means to use them.
“The people who are most impacted are older people, those on low incomes and those experiencing disability,” Anderson says.
“In terms of age profiles, older people are the most impacted, and second are young school leavers and young working age adults. That is commonly missed that this is not something that just affects older people; it is hitting younger people hard, especially in the cost of living crisis.”
Smartphone shortcoming
She highlights another important element in that, while a lot of those affected possess smartphones, this is not enough to ensure they are fully connected.
“It’s something we need to learn from in terms of attitudes in the UK. If someone has one it does not mean they are fully connected and literate. Try doing your homework or writing a CV on your smartphone and you’ll soon realise that is not what you really need.
“If you have a tablet with a keyboard it can be sufficient as long as it is big enough.”
This was a feature of the DPA’s evaluation report of its Tech for Families programme, published in August, which highlighted how there was an active debate about schoolchildren having access to online services during the Covid-19 lockdown, but that it quickly subsided after the lockdown ended.
“The issue has not gone away but does not get a focus any more, and there are people who are really suffering in terms of their results and attainment,” she says.
DPA initiatives
In trying to overcome digital poverty, the organisation has a series of initiatives including proof of concept projects, webinars and the publication of an evidence review and socio-economic assessment.
These are accompanied by its work with partners on localised delivery schemes to give people devices. These involve local authorities, healthcare bodies and third sector organisations, reflecting their knowledge of local communities, and the fact that digital poverty tends to be concentrated in geographical pockets.
“Evidently inner city locations with the highest levels of poverty have the highest levels of digital poverty, and there tends to be more support available in city locations,” Anderson says. “That is why in our delivery we tend to focus on rural, coastal and post-industrial towns.
“In some of the ex-seaside resorts that are now incredibly deprived, you see lots of people with low incomes and low aspirations with nowhere to turn in terms of digital inclusion. These are areas that always need more support.”
She points to local and regional authorities such as Greater Manchester, Leeds and Essex that have done a lot to promote digital inclusion, but says the squeeze on finances tends to hold back the majority from running programmes or having somebody in charge of the issue.
This creates the need – which she is hoping to see fulfilled by the new Government – to provide a funding settlement that allows local authorities to place a focus on the issue.
Innovation imperative
But money for digital champions and schemes for passing on old devices will not be enough, and Anderson identifies the need for more innovation in the area.
“We need something that is going to shift the needle on this,” she says.
“From a connectivity perspective we are great proponents of open roaming and mesh networks, being able to use all the unused bandwidth that sits in the public and private sector.
“If you think about the public sector, the vast majority of the internet for its buildings and networks is unused after 5.00, so if we could find ways to get that to people who need it through mesh networks that would be great. In terms of kit and devices, the market is not going to magically provide laptops that are incredibly cheap and affordable for those without disposable income.
“But we would like to see all public sector devices – and we know there is warmth for this idea in DSIT – at point of refresh coming to the third sector to be revitalised and distributed to those in need.
“There are initiatives, but we need to move from one-offs in local areas to a consistent, concerted approach that is always on, where these devices are always coming through. We know different local authorities have different budgetary pressures and different priorities, but digital inclusion is fundamental and we need it everywhere.”
Delivery plan phases
The DPA has a national delivery plan in four phases, the first of which is running until June of next year. Much of it is focused on groundwork and raising awareness of digital poverty, reflecting its concerns that, in a survey carried out early in 2023, only one in five of the public recognised the term.
It has also been sowing seeds for research, local capacity building, what digital skills mean and to do more with the new Government and the private sector.
Aderson says: “Next summer we’ll launch the third iteration of the delivery plan, which will also kick off phase two, which will look more at the best practice coming from local areas and how it could be scalable for national solutions.
“It will also pick up on some innovation ideas, particularly on affordability, and how we take some initial ideas and develop them. And we will look at how we could work with government, local authorities and the private sector on a social return on investment model, building on research we did with Deloitte last year on building a socio-economic case.”
The latter will take research on the issue into new areas, looking to demonstrate the impact that solving digital poverty has on a number of key outcomes. This will include the obvious things such as employability and educational outcomes, but also health outcomes, tackling loneliness and how it extends into issues such as reducing crime rates.
Progress with charter
The DPA also made the news in June of this year with the publication of its Charter for Digital Inclusion, calling on organisations to commit to three or more goals on raising awareness, accessible services, device donation, digital skills development and partnership for impact.
“It’s starting to take off,” Anderson says. “We have some big companies signed up, like Virgin Media O2 and Phoenix Group, and we’re also seeing local authorities, health trusts, universities and smaller businesses come onboard.
“We released it in June and we’re just a few days from contacting all the original signatories to ask what action they have taken. It’s been exciting to see organisations do device drops, getting devices refurbished, and upskilling so non-desk based staff who don’t use digital in their work are raising their skills.”
She is also optimistic about the Government’s attitude towards the issue since its election in July, saying the ministers at the top of DSIT have raised the focus, but that she hopes it can do more by using its convening power to support relevant efforts.
“It could work with the MHCLG (Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government) to get the message out to local authorities,” she says. “There are some local authorities that are real rock stars, achieving so much for their communities, but also a lot where they have not had the support they need to push on digital inclusion. So we want to see more happening through MHCLG.”
Cautionary note
While expressing plenty of optimism, she concludes with a note of caution for government bodies looking to accelerate their provision of digital services.
“When there is a programme to leverage savings by moving more services online, it’s absolutely fundamental that we don’t push services away from the people who need it most. We have to remember there will always be some people, certainly in the short term, who are not online, don’t have the skills, don’t have the money, who can’t just make it work.
“Don’t push people into exclusion.”
