Time to make Mr Brown take notice

The Chancelleor's decision to axe the HCI initiative has left the IT industry reeling. Sara Driscoll asks what this means for the channel

It seems the government has done it again. While our industry throws up its hands and shakes its head in disgust, the Treasury sighs with relief because it no longer has to shell out for middle-class system abusers greedily snapping up all manner of IT luxuries.

But when Chancellor Gordon Brown axed the Home Computing Initiative (HCI) as part of his channel-damaging Budget (I’m thinking also of the additional tax on cigarettes and alcohol here), did he really expect such an outcry?

While we are all well aware of how vocal our sector can be, Mr Brown may be protected from this by the softly, softly approach taken by some of the industry organisations that sit between the IT sector and the government.

But these organisations have already been bypassed by various companies that have been directly lobbying for the scheme to be reinstated. And we are not talking about a few VARs based on some trading estate in the back of beyond. If I was in a corporate battle, I would feel safer having the overwhelming muscle of Intel, BT and Microsoft on my side. Whether or not Mr Brown can really afford to put the noses of such companies out of joint still remains to be seen, as does the overall investment effect this HCI U-turn is likely to have on UK plc.

The government has claimed the scheme was cancelled because of people getting the wrong type of equipment, such as PlayStation Portables and iPods instead of PCs and laptops, and because it was not targeting the low-paid, as it was intended to do. But these are surely reasons to simply police the scheme better, not cancel it.

If our industry can organise itself to run a single, joined-up campaign to get the HCI scheme reinstated, using reasoned arguments and putting structures in place that would placate government fears of middle-class greediness, and get the lower paid into the IT world, then we can force Mr Brown to take notice of a sector that continues to bolster government coffers.