70% of government bodies responding to the NAO’s survey identified difficulties in recruiting and retaining staff with AI skills as a barrier to AI adoption.31 In January 2025, the government’s State of digital government review set out the digital and data skills challenge faced by government, reporting difficulties in recruitment (around 50% of roles advertised in civil service digital and data campaigns in 2024 were unfilled), pay levels that were uncompetitive with the private sector, such as a 35% pay gap between public and private sector technical architects (equivalent to £30,000 per year), and the need for more technical roles within the profession.32 DSIT told us that 5.4% of the civil service workforce is in the digital and data profession, which compares unfavourably to the private sector benchmark of 8–12%, depending on the industry. It also told us that the skills mix within the profession was imbalanced, and that it relies too much on outsourcing for the more technical roles.33 Commenting more broadly on the findings of the review, the DSIT said that “there are many challenges and they are not evenly distributed” across government.