In late March 2026, we ran the 12th edition of our public-facing meetup on public sector innovation. We dedicated the evening to the theme \u2018Remaking the welfare state\u2019, <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The event description stated the following:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nA welfare state takes responsibility for its people and supports them when in need. When costs are rising, but budgets aren\u2019t, government needs to find efficiency gains to maintain social protection levels. A government-commissioned report recently recommended ways to modernise social and welfare services, making them more people-friendly and less bureaucratic. Meanwhile, small and large projects are underway to make benefits services more fair and easier to navigate, and to make the state overall more equitable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At our March meetup, we will hear about what a modern, digitally transformed welfare state looks like.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
The first presenter was Dr Florian Thei\u00dfing, Innovation Lead at think tank Agora Digitale Transformation<\/a>. He shared a study on housing benefits in Germany and how they can be digitally reimagined, seeing social benefits as a blueprint for user-centred digital government.<\/p>\n\n\n\n