Shadow Chancellor George Osborne has promised that an incoming Conservative government would create a level playing field for open source software in the UK, in a move which could save taxpayers more than £600 million a year. In a speech at the Royal Society of Arts, he also announced the appointment of Mark Thompson, of the Judge Business School at Cambridge University, to advise the Party on how to make Britain the open source leader in Europe. Mr Osborne reckoned that opening up the market in software would enable the Government to slash 5 per cent off Whitehall's annual IT bill, because open software allows users to read, change and improve its code, in contrast to proprietary software where a company controls the source code. Pointing out that the Japanese government is moving its entire payroll system over to an open-source platform, a switch that is expected to cut operating costs by half, while in the Spanish region of Extremadura, the administration migrated 70,000 desktops and 400 servers in its schools to open source software, saving over £10 million, the Shadow Chancellor said: "Here in the UK, some public bodies have already shown what can be achieved." I saw George Osbourne the other day on TV, replying to the latest budget released by Gordon Brown. Like my dad, I'll probably end up voting Conservative because of things like this. Another reason is that Labour refused to protect child bus fairs where I live, and so I will now have to pay £2.80 to get to the town centre and back. For a student, thats a lot just for transport! Conservative Party - News Story
