Constructive relationships between government and its IT suppliers are crucial to achieving the £20bn of savings in Sir Peter Gershon's Efficiency Review of the civil service.

Gershon, former chief executive of Whitehall buying agency the Office of Government Commerce (OGC), told a roundtable organised by Masons solicitors last week that the government doesn't need new technology projects, but must make better use of existing investments.

'We have got to continue to improve and strengthen the maturing of the relationship between IT suppliers and the public sector so success is more likely than it has been in the past,' he said.

Lessons have been learned from past problems but there are still improvements to be made, says Gershon.

'When I left OGC in March there were still projects going to the early stages of a Gateway review with a pre-determined go-live date and no plan of how to get from here to there,' he said.