19 August 2002

E-mpower?

By Rt. Hon. David Davis MP, Shadow Deputy Prime Minister

Politicians of whichever party are engaged in attempting to find solutions that will make people's lives better - but this cannot take place in a vacuum. It is all very well attempting to devise new solutions to problems, but if we lack the means to deliver these solutions in a meaningful way, then all our endeavours are useless.

Increasingly, we have seen importance attached to technology remedying falling participation rates not only in voting but in society generally.

The Electoral Commission released 'Modernising Elections: A Strategic Evaluation of the 2002 Electoral Pilot Schemes' based on trials conducted in 30 local authorities. While the Government has released the consultation paper, 'In Service of Democracy' as a means of canvassing the development of a detailed response to e-voting and e-participation.

What does e-government offer?:

It is worth beginning with a basic premise - that new technologies offer a unique opportunity to change the way we conduct government at all levels.

In the past, people have been largely passive receivers of government services - Governments have decided what they should receive and how they should receive it. In this model, Government or the Local Authority is very much the decision-maker - the citizen simply takes what they are given.

Society today does not work like that.

Now more than ever before, we live in a consumer society. People are used to choosing both what they use and how they use it. So the decision-making process has been inverted. It should, therefore, no longer be a top-down relationship - it should come from the bottom up.

This is the first opportunity e-government affords. It empowers people by multiplying the choices they have. They can access the services they want, when they want, where they want.

There is a second potential benefit of implementing an effective e-government strategy - I say potential for, as I shall explain, it is a benefit that is being largely missed at the moment. This is the fact that it brings government services closer to people who may have had difficulty in accessing them before.

For example, disabled people should be able to make far greater use of services if they are delivered to them in their own homes. But it's not simply disabled people; there are all sorts of vulnerable groups who rely on central government or their local authority for important services, whether in the areas of health, education or social services.

If by extending e-government we can reach out to these people, then we will have achieved something real and important.

Although, we must ensure that citizens who are not part of technological revolution and who do not want to join are not disenfranchised through a mono-focal emphasis upon e-government.

As an example of our approach to increasing participation, more than 4,000 organisations will be targeted by the Conservative Party and asked to sign up to a monthly service to keep them informed of developments at Westminster affecting young people. Recipients will also be urged to contribute to the development of the party's policies.

But there is a further issue of empowerment to be considered. In a consumer society people are more aware of their rights and their expectations. We should therefore think about how we can exploit e-government so that complaints about government services are dealt with more speedily. What now takes weeks or even months could potentially be resolved in days if only we think about this process differently.

So, e-government should be about empowering people.

E-Government enables us to enhance the quantity and quality of information we provide. There are real opportunities to open the closed doors of national and local government, by reinventing the way we use and distribute information.

Protection against fraud and failure

If proposals are brought forward arising from the Government's consultation paper which will genuinely improve the way government works, while also safeguarding the civil liberties of individual citizens, we will look at them very carefully.

The Conservative Party will support any sensible measures that encourage more people to vote and participate, provided proper safeguards are in place against electoral fraud and technological failure.

A computer system crashing has the same impact as a polling station closing early on polling day. The denial of the right to vote to citizens can only have a deleterious impact upon democracy while electoral systems must be protected from computer hackers organising 'e-coups'.

With the Electoral Commission report admitting that that three quarters of voters stating that the new methods made no difference as to whether they would vote, the Government would do better to look at the causes of the current deficit of political participation.

The key to tackling voter apathy does not lie in creating new types of politician, gimmicky voting schemes or regional assemblies. It involves addressing the concerns of people over the decaying NHS, falling school standards, rising crime and building on greenfields land.

Labour's approach to e-government has resulted in extra costs and limited take-up. Since 1997, Labour's history has been characterised by increasingly bold statements accompanied by poorer performance.

We will wait and see whether the conclusion of this consultation process will be any different.