IfG.CC - The Institute for eGovernment

The government's recent decision to invite members of the public to give feedback on its online services is a welcome but long overdue move

The government's identity card project has come under fire this month from a new quarter - the London business community. The London Chamber of Commerce (LCC) polled 165 company directors and found that only just over a quarter believed that ID cards would benefit their organisation in some way.

However, when the organisation polled its members on the same subject two years ago, the response was much more positive, with 73 percent in favour of the scheme. The LCC attributed the decline in support to firms preferring to see public money spent on alternative methods for dealing with terrorism - the government's core argument for introducing the cards - such as more stop-and-search initiatives or the re-introduction of conductors on buses.

The issue of where public money is best spent - or least likely to be wasted - could hold up the ID cards project. Many of the government's recent efforts to modernise its services through new technology have failed to meet expectations, and have caused more problems than they were supposed to solve. So it's not surprising that businesses would prefer to see money channelled into more tried-and-tested models based on human interaction rather than IT.

Perhaps the government's forthcoming e-services strategy will encourage businesses to have more faith in future technology projects, however. E-government minister Jim Murphy outlined a series of new measures last week aimed at getting better results from government IT projects and putting users at the heart of public services.

Murphy cited examples of IT use good and bad, from which he said lessons had been learnt. One example of good practice was the story of a partially paralysed man who was able to work from home as a schools network administrator in the Outer Hebrides, partly due to the arrival of broadband. And on the other side, a group of Kent youngsters claimed that government web sites were wordy, clunky or clumsy.

The government plans to establish a Customer Insight Panel to get feedback on how public services are being used and accessed, and how the systems could be improved. I'd advise the government against inviting too many panel participants from the "youth of today" camp such as the Kent youngsters, however. Teenagers' sole purpose in life is to be resolutely unimpressed with anything not involving the latest trainers/ringtones/games consoles. So it's unlikely they'll prove useful sources of insight on issues such as speeding up the process of removing abandoned vehicles or reducing the number of missed appointments with doctors.

The general idea behind the panels is a good one, though. The public sector spends around £14bn a year on IT, so anything that might help to ensure taxpayers get better value from this massive financial outlay is to be welcomed. Hopefully the government will act on its plans and develop online services that are more useful to the public, and that are tailored to a wider range of individuals.

However, that doesn't erase the fact that it has taken until 2005 - the target year for getting all government services online and after most of the budget for this has already been spent - to announce plans to allow people to have input into the process. Hopefully this won't be a case of too little, too late.

Autor: Madeline Bennett

Quelle: IT Week, 18.10.2005