The Eternal Pilot
Deep in the administrative heart of Nottinghamshire, a small government programme has achieved something remarkable: fifteen consecutive years of unqualified success coupled with absolute resistance to expansion. The Digital Inclusion Initiative for Rural Communities (DIIRC) has become what policy experts describe as "the Schrödinger's cat of public administration" – simultaneously the most successful programme in government and completely unavailable to anyone who might benefit from it.
Launched in 2009 with a modest budget and ambitious goals, DIIRC was designed to test innovative approaches to digital connectivity in underserved rural areas. What nobody anticipated was that it would become so successful at being a pilot that the concept of graduation would become philosophically impossible.
A Record of Unprecedented Achievement
The programme's statistics make for compelling reading. Over fifteen years, DIIRC has connected 847 households to high-speed broadband, established twelve community technology centres, and trained 2,341 residents in digital skills. Customer satisfaction ratings consistently exceed 98%, operational costs have decreased annually since 2011, and the programme has generated £3.2 million in local economic activity.
These results have earned DIIRC seventeen separate commendations from various government departments, four mentions in white papers, and the admiration of digital policy experts across Europe. What they have not earned is permission to operate anywhere outside a carefully defined 47-square-mile area around the village of Upper Bramblewood.
Photo: Upper Bramblewood, via boardingpassesready.com
The Science of Perpetual Testing
Dr. Miranda Scope-Creep, who leads the Department for Digital Infrastructure's Programme Evaluation Unit, has overseen DIIRC's assessment process since 2012. Her team has produced 127 evaluation reports, each concluding that the programme works exceptionally well and should definitely be expanded, pending further evaluation.
"The beauty of DIIRC is that it proves conclusively that our approach works," explains Dr. Scope-Creep. "However, proving that it works everywhere would require testing it everywhere, which would no longer be a pilot. It's a fascinating paradox."
The evaluation methodology has evolved considerably over the years. Initial assessments focused on simple metrics like connection speeds and user satisfaction. Current evaluations examine "longitudinal sustainability indicators," "cross-sectoral integration potential," and "scalability readiness matrices." The most recent report, published in March, runs to 847 pages and concludes that DIIRC is "optimally positioned for pre-implementation phase transition planning."
The Review Industrial Complex
DIIRC's success has spawned an entire ecosystem of assessment activity. The programme has been reviewed by seventeen different committees, inspected by four separate agencies, and studied by researchers from eleven universities. The total cost of reviewing DIIRC now exceeds the programme's operational budget by a factor of three.
Professor Timothy Methodology-Singh from the Institute for Policy Implementation Studies has been observing DIIRC since 2015: "It's become a perfect example of evidence-based policymaking. We have overwhelming evidence that it works, which provides an excellent basis for gathering more evidence about whether it might work."
The most recent review, conducted by the Cabinet Office's Strategic Innovation Assessment Panel, concluded that DIIRC represents "best practice in pilot programme management" and recommended establishing a new pilot to test whether the DIIRC model could be successfully piloted in other locations.
Local Perspective
Residents of Upper Bramblewood have mixed feelings about their unique status as Britain's most thoroughly evaluated rural community. Janet Broadband-Henderson, who completed DIIRC's digital skills training in 2011, has since become the programme's unofficial ambassador.
"It's lovely that we're special," she explains while demonstrating the community centre's state-of-the-art video conferencing equipment. "Though it does seem odd that people keep visiting to study why our internet works so well instead of just giving other places the same internet."
Local councillor Derek Consultation-Fatigue has attended 73 separate meetings about DIIRC's future: "We've had more consultations about expanding this programme than some countries have had elections. At this point, I think the consultations have their own consultations."
The Scaling Conundrum
Current Digital Minister Rebecca Innovation-Pathway recently announced a major breakthrough in DIIRC's development: the establishment of a new taskforce to examine the possibility of creating a framework for considering the potential establishment of additional pilots based on DIIRC's model.
"We're committed to scaling up this tremendous success," Minister Innovation-Pathway confirmed during a recent parliamentary statement. "However, scaling requires careful consideration of scaling methodologies, which is why we're piloting our approach to scaling pilots."
The new taskforce will spend eighteen months developing a "Pilot Replication Strategy Framework," which will then be tested through a pilot programme in the West Midlands. If successful, the pilot will be evaluated to determine whether it's ready for a larger pilot testing the framework's scalability.
Photo: West Midlands, via www.freeworldmaps.net
Future Horizons
DIIRC's fifteenth anniversary celebrations will include the unveiling of a new evaluation centre, where researchers can study the programme's success in purpose-built facilities. Plans are also underway for a documentary about DIIRC's journey, tentatively titled "The Pilot That Could (But Hasn't)."
As Dr. Scope-Creep noted in her latest report: "DIIRC proves that with sufficient evaluation, any programme can achieve perfect results indefinitely. We're essentially revolutionising the concept of success through strategic inaction."
The programme's future remains, as always, under active consideration pending the completion of ongoing reviews.
