IfG.CC -
Institute for eGovernment

40% of WA's new digital fund will be dedicated to future health IT projects.

Western Australia has handed down its 2021-22 state budget, revealing it will establish a AU$500 million digital capability fund for upgrading legacy IT systems and streamlining government services.

To be doled out over four years, the fund is aimed at progressing the government's digital transformation agenda and follows the same timeline as the state government's 2021-25 digital strategy that was released back in June.

Premier Colin Barnett made the announcement yesterday, saying that agency roll-ins to shared finance and payroll systems would be halted until the review could be completed.

Under the review, the state government will consider what the OSS has done in its seven-year history, what could be done better and how it could achieve better value for money.

The WA Police Force is responsible for policing the world’s largest single jurisdiction covering 2.5 million square kilometres across the massive state of Western Australia.

Superintendent Lance Martin, programme director with WA Police, says this improved mobile communications service is helping officers access information in real-time, while supporting field operations.

The initiative, funded under the Liberal-National Government’s Royalties for Regions Program, is the centerpiece of the State Government’s spending on health in the 2011-2012 State Budget and aims to reform and improve access to healthcare, according to a government statement.

In an extraordinary statement, the Western Australian Premier Colin Barnett informed the press that the OSS was “probably one of the great bungles of public administration in Western Australia.”

“This has been a very expensive and largely failed program,” he said.

The software will provide Enterprise Master Patient Index and Enterprise Provider Index, including implementation and integration with other healthcare systems and data cleansing.

The Health Identifiers Solution will be integrated with existing and proposed WA Health systems and interfaced with other providers’ systems and with the National Health Identifiers service.

ETS is available across the State and has supported more than 58,000 emergency cases since it began, and now deals with about 300 cases a week.

Western Australia's virtual emergency department has been expanded to a 24/7 service. The WA Country Health Service's Emergency Telehealth Service (ETS) is now available around-the-clock from its 78 rural and remote locations.

This regional mobile communications project (RMPP) will boost high-speed, fast-access coverage across major roads, highways and regional communities.

The RMPP project kicks off with a US$41 million (AUD$38.2 million) three-year contract that has been awarded to Australian telco, Telstra.

The Western Australian Department of Treasury and Finance has claimed success in implementing key projects across the past year as it looks to fully modernise its revenues, tax and shared services systems by 2013

According to its annual report for the 2009/2010 financial year, the government will finalise a roll out of Oracle e-Business systems by mid-2012, seeing a total of 90 agencies gain access to the shared services platform. A total of 14 agencies were rolled in during the past year, with plans to roll in a further 20 agencies across 2010-2011. The systems, focussed around project operations and shared services, are expected to enable whole-of-government industrial awards, the first of which were completed and implemented over the past year.

The eHealth System will be made available to all stakeholders responsible for providing health services and benefits to defence staff, including clinicians, the Department of Veterans’ Affairs, and civilian health providers.

Last month, I was proud to unveil Australia's first ever Digital Transformation Strategy, which will revolutionise the delivery of government services over the next seven years and ensure we remain a world leader for digital government.

The strategy sets out a bold and detailed plan on how we intend to achieve our goals and was backed by a roadmap containing more than $1.5 billion worth of fully funded digital initiatives that will be rolled out over the next two years.

The Prime Minister’s announcement on Monday 7 December of a National Innovation and Science Agenda is a welcome development.

However, the challenge will be for the government to turnaround our National Innovation System (NIS) which has been steadily in decline for some time.

As outlined in the Prime Minister’s statement, Australia has many world class businesses, universities and research organisations. However, Australia ranks at the bottom of the OECD group of advanced nations in relation to university-industry collaboration.

Seen by some as sitting on the wrong side of the world, Australia wants to plug deeper into the global economy by turbo-charging its broadband power. The nation is funding an ambitious plan to deliver high-speed Internet to its population of 22 million.

At 36 billion Australian dollars ($36.4 billion), it is the single largest infrastructure investment in the nation’s history.

But the national broadband network — or NBN, as it’s known — has divided opinion on political, economic and technological lines since it was first proposed in 2007.

The New South Wales budget for the 2013-14 financial year shows a strong ICT focus compared to other states in Australia, according to the Australian Computer Society. The NSW government released the budget today.

“ACS is pleased that the NSW government has recognised the importance of ICT to the NSW economy,” said Adam Redman, ACS head of policy and external affairs.

The Australian Internet Industry Association (AIIA) has criticised the government for moving slowly on ICT innovation, urging it to act now or risk hindering Australia’s ability to compete in the global digital economy.