Jim Fitzpatrick discusses take-up, sustainability and the future of local eGovernment
Jim Fitzpatrick, the new Local eGovernment Minister, has laid out to eGov monitor the key priorities and challenges driving the longer-term vision for local eGovernment.
Speaking in an exclusive interview, the Minister confirms that he sees increasing the public usage of e-services as the biggest obstacle to success.
"The largest challenge facing the eGovernment programme will be take-up of the new and improved channels and services", says Mr Fitzpatrick, who took up his post as Parliamentary Under Secretary of State at the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister in May.
"Although the adoption of eGovernment brings immediate results, its major benefits will only be realised when citizens use e-enabled services in significant numbers."
Councils, he adds, should be "designing services with the customer in mind" and have a clear strategy in place for "promoting the appropriate access channel to the right audience".
Questioned on what issues are at the top of his agenda for local eGovernment, the Minister's foremost concern is to prevent the efforts so far from going to waste.
Mr Fitzpatrick told eGov monitor: "The overriding priority facing e-government is to ensure that the investment to date is protected and continues to bear fruit."
Work currently ongoing to hand over responsibility for the Local eGovernment National Projects will enable councils, he says, "to continue to reap benefits from the products".
Looking to the future, the Minister acknowledges that change management will be an ongoing issue for local eGovernment.
"Embedding the cultural change that is entailed by eGovernment is a long term business and remains a challenge for some authorities.
"We wish to ensure that the benefits and the momentum gained through the programme are preserved and sustained by mainstreaming e-government within central and local government policy and practice."
Mr Fitzpatrick sees eGovernment as helping to "transform the relationship between the citizen and state", having an important role in particular in tackling social exclusion.
"e-Government can lead to a more personalised and better targetted service for excluded people and should, for example, reduce the number of times people will have to produce the same information to claim different benefits", he says.
"It will also lead to increased resources for face to face service delivery", the Minister continues, "so the less advantages ought to benefit from a higher quality service.
"For those marginalized from mainstream society, such as the homeless and runaways, the internet can open up channels of communication with their families which may have long been closed."
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