UK Government Online - Essay Example

UK Government Online Abstract: The research on ‘UK Government online’ closely evaluates the reality behind the achievement of 25% of the e-enablement of the Government websites. For this the study conducted a historical evaluation of the statements and reports published by the UK government and EU guidelines on the framework for website guidelines to check what is being achieved and what is being understood against the facts that re anticipated. The study took an instance of rural youth accessibility issue as the metric for e-enablement and identified that there is poor policy framework around this particular social inclusion aspect by enhancing the technology accessibility through e-enablement. The research observed the statement before 2005 and the changes taken place in the government’s perception on ‘fully online’ during 2006 and 2007. The research found that there is major revolutionary change in the government’s direction, which is just focused towards ‘accessibility’, more than ‘fully online’ Introduction: The concept of e-Government was born was originated way back in 1996 and has taken so many turn till today. But the architectural framework that connects government information and services was for its e-government programme is released in 2001(ukon-line.gov.uk). The key features of this architectural framework are: 1. Portals that aggregate all government information and services in one place (uk online) or aggregate them with the information and services of relevant third parties. The portals can be accessed via the internet or indirectly using uk online centres, call centres or other intermediaries. 2. A Government gateway. The gateway provides the necessary security and authentication to enable different parts of government to conduct secure electronic transactions with citizens. It also provides routing and connection services from the portal(s) to departments. The gateway is not visible to users as such. In the NZ model it is the connection point between the seamless front and back offices. 3. Government secure intranet. This provides the connectivity between departments STAGES OF DEVELOPMENT Like any new development e-government will progress through a number of stages. The Gartner Group has characterized these stages from as: 1. Show Publication of information on-line but with no electronic communication or exchange. 2. Interact Users can communicate electronically with the government agency or download forms for submission in paper form. 3. Transact Two way communication on-line with the government agency and transactions can be undertaken and completed on-line. 4. Integrate One-stop shops, integration of services between departments and levels of government. And according to Dr Ballard, the transition from stage 1 to stage 2 is fairly simple. The move to stage 3 is more difficult involving development and use of both new technologies and business practices. Reaching stage 4 requires a major cultural leap in business practices, organizational structures and governance processes. Minister for local e-government, Jim Fitzpatrick, said: "Over the last five years Local Government has taken up the challenge to transform the way that citizens are able to access the services. It is very satisfying that e-enablement targets have now been reached. This is a success story and recent research bears out this transformation. After randomly selecting 10 of the best known names across multiple industry sectors in the FTSE 100, we pitted their performance against a range of local authorities across the country. On average, local authorities came out on top in terms of the speed of their websites - and achieved over 99% availability figures. The challenge for local government now is to ensure that this valuable work continues and that innovation and focus on the needs of local people continue to be at the heart of local e-government." The next challenge now, is to raise awareness even further of the new services available.   Literature review: Liam Byrne, who was a former Andersen Consultant, proposed ‘24-hour e-access to government services, which he estimated would save £3.5bn a year’ in a 1997 report. And it took two years for Byrne's ideas to become policy, in the 1999 paper on modernizing Government, in which 2008 was set as a deadline for 100% e-enabling of public services. Labour Party, which had described Government Direct as "too little, too late", came to power saying it wanted to modernize the government machine. In the run-up to the election, several ministers had visited the IT unit and voiced enthusiasm for its ideas. In 2005, Tony Blair has made a statement that ‘his first e-government target: to have 25% of services "e-enabled" by 2008’. The UK Cabinet Office made an announcement in December 2004 that 96% of Government services would be e-enabled by the end of 2005, meaning that the target of full electronic service delivery capability set in 2000 will be almost met. This month's Implementing Electronic Government (IEG) returns show that the average local authority is now 97% e-enabled based upon returns from all authorities in England. During this time, the Cabinet Office also stated through its Electronic Service Delivery report, that 75% of government services were already available online by the end of June 2004, against 74% at the end of March 2004 Mean while the recent Government reports illlustrate a performance improvement with the local e-governmetn intiitatives. Folowing are the evidence of such notifications: The March 2006 IEG6 returns from all local authorities in England show that: the average local authority is now 98 per cent e-enabled 84 per cent of Priority Service Outcomes delivered (on 'green') by the end of March and 15 per cent in the active process of being delivered (on 'amber')  the residual 2 per cent of e-enablement is accounted for by legal or operational barriers, allowed within the definition of Best Value Performance Indicator 157 (which measures local authority performance against the 2005 target) around 15 million individuals (unique users) visited local authority websites per month during 2005/06, this figure is part of a rising trend. Some definitions of e-government explains the meaning as below: “Use of new and emerging information communication technologies to deliver government services and build closer relationships between government and citizens” To a lay person e-government is most likely seen as: “the delivery of Government information and services on-line via the internet”. Both these definitions emphasise that e-government is a means of providing services and communicating, not an end in itself. When the above definitions are clearly stating that, the online services are continuous offer, how can the government is saying that it has achieved 74%, 75% and 96 % of online services However, the recent Government Direct set out seven principles for electronic public services. One among them is – ‘Accessibility Services available whenever and wherever required, including by people in remote areas, with limited mobility.’ Hence the current study tries to evaluate the accessibility issue of rural youth through e-government perspective against the above notifications. Case of accessibility of technology for Youth through e-initiatives: When considering the issue of social inclusion and accessibility to rural youth, there should be enough information available to the youth to enhance their livelihood mechanisms like technology, infrastructure and educational facilities. So the study intends to observe the availability of such information to rural youth on the UK Government websites. For this purpose, the study makes a close evaluation of the framework guidelines proposed by EU on the website accessibility issues, particularly for local authorities. Several authors (Mates, 1999; Paciello, 2000; Lilly and Van Fleet, 1999) have detailed how a variety of disabilities can cause individuals to stumble on the path in cyberspace as well as how changes to Web design combined with adaptive devices overcome barriers to information access. In 1999, Erica B. Lilly and Connie Van Fleet looked at the main library Web pages of the 100 universities listed in Yahoo’s 1998 list of the "100 Most Wired Colleges." Their study, "Wired But Not Connected: Accessibility of Academic Library Home Pages" found only 40 out of the 100 sites were accessible according to Bobby (Lilly and Van Fleet, 1999). Guthrie, in her study, "Making the World Wide Web Accessible to All Students," looked at the academic home pages of 80 colleges of communication and schools of journalism in the United States and Canada. Using Bobby to evaluate the sites, she found that 63 did not meet the criteria for accessibility (Guthrie, 2000). But still there is a concern that local authority websites need to be developed based on citizen’s needs and preferences. A public website will need to contain information that is useful to citizens, presented in a way that will help them with their enquiries, and which will enable them to transact business with local authorities. The Local authorities in order to say that they have achieved the performance levels should measure their website with web performance management tools, customer surveys and user testing. Unitary, county, district and borough levels of local government, working together, provide over 700 services. If the government’s vision for a modernized, e-enabled government is to be realized, then local government websites have a major part to play. The utility of the website is an integral part of a communications strategy for the local authority. Hence it will reflect the status and maturity of the communication channel, including measures of policy, performance and self-assessment in enabling interactions for electronic service delivery. The framework guidelines for the e-enablement has given certain aspects to check the performance of the website to be called as enabled. Policy documents: The local authorities should contain the policy documents that are aimed for the benefit of the citizens. These documents make the user understand clearly about the strategy and objectives of the website for which it working under the guidelines of government. e-democracy the recent government trend shows a changed opinion on government websites that Internet is not only is used for e-voting, but also for consultation. Hence the local authority websites are expected to have user-friendly interactive features, such as online questionnaires, discussion groups and web chat assistance. Be both accessible and usable A local government website must offer content and services that are relevant and usable. By law, people with disabilities must be able to use online information and transactions. This is a very doubtful case in rural areas, where Internet accessibility itself is in poor condition. Local government websites exist for the benefit of the user The website should enable citizens to find information they want, either about services they need, or about issues they are interested in. The website should not expect citizens to understand how or why services are distributed amongst the authority’s various departments or among different levels of government. Websites should work together to give users to the information or services they need. Websites must by law be accessible, and should meet the Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) standards on accessibility. The above priorities when examined against rural youth issues for urban areas are not evidenced in all circumstances. And the websites were not proved with detailed information exactly what the rural young user will be looking for- eg: technology infrastructure, accessibility of tutorials, libraries, job information, community center coaching etc., which are truly desired by the rural youth. It is observed that digital divide still plays a role in e-enabling the services. The Recent Trend in e-enablement: According to a report published by the UK Cabinet Office on the public sector accessibility, nearly 97% of websites failed in the accessibility tests while only 3% of 436 public sector websites achieve a minimum standard of accessibility. This was the report published in March 2006. The same report stated that ‘no website met the standard demanded by a European Parliament Resolution of 2002’. The Resolution on Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) of the Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) states that, "for websites to be accessible, it is essential that they are double-A compliant." This was the condition for the accessibility status from the three years, proclaims the same report. The reasons for such poor performance in accessibility were identified such as missing text alternatives from images and poor navigation and scrolling. The recommendations of the report that was commissioned for the UK Presidency of the EU include setting "a clear target for making all public sector websites in the EU conform with WCAG 1.0 Level Double-A by 2010 as part of the i2010 strategy to promote an inclusive European information society." But when the websites are evaluated against the WGAG Version 1.0, there is a very little progress found with the local authority websites, irrespective of their individual ratings. Another recommendations in the publication include applicable W3C WAI guidance requirements into all procurements of new website designs, major upgrades, and all outsourced content production (such as reports, publications, etc). The European Commission proposed changing public procurement rules expecting in this way from all the member country websites to be enabled by the end of 2005. Hence the Cabinet Office report made an urge to web managers and developers all public sector organizations to get existing sites up to Level A by the end of 2006 and to achieve Level AA by end of 2008. When the accessibility it self is proved poor , how can a service be called as 100% e-enabled in terms of reaching the public by making a way online. Adrian Hancock on April 2007 made a post saying that Dick Vinegar picked up a report ‘that only 26% of local authorities have achieved the transactional status on their websites’. Web-based transactional services is one of the priority services mentioned in the framework of e-enabling for Local e-governments to make it easy for citizens to do business with the council. 'Dick' further comments that ‘he thought we had achieved 100% 'e enablement' by the end of 2005 irrespective of the following facts Can we be 100% e enabled with only 26% of council websites achieving transactional status?: There are some missing links between figures and facts that are making us to be approved for the achievement Have more achieved it, but we have missed them?: This clearly illustrates his inability to locate the information regarding the achievement metrics and results Are there other measures?: Truly there is no consolidation or uniqueness found against the measurements against which these % figures are being proved. The recent status of Government websites: Though Government local authorities express they are 92% or 100% e-enabled, there is lot of anonymity about which information will be available on what site. The large number of websites is one of the reason for this ambiguity as well, the poor linkage between allied services. Andrew Pinder states "It is obviously confusing to have over 3,000 government sites," On January 2007, the BBC news announced that Government is closing down the 551 sites out of 951 websites. Where only 26 are for definite stay, and the rest of the Government sites are also going to be dropped down from the functional list. The government intends to have streamlined information of all these websites through two main websites- Directgov and Business Link. Conclusion: The study found that there is a fact that the UK government has proved the achievement of ‘e-enabling’ levels in certain instances against certain parameters. But on the whole, when compared against the accessibility guidelines framed by EU, there is not even single instance noted against certain parameters. This fact supports the statement that e-enabling of services is not even reached to 25%. But surpassing these achievement levels, now the government is looking for integrated accessibility from two government websites instead of navigating through 3000 websites. References: Top 10 Guidelines for UK local government websites, accessed on April 20, 2007, Available from Tim Richardson, Local councils adopt '24/7 culture', accessed on April 11, 2007, Available from Public sector websites fail accessibility tests: OUT-LAW News, accessed on April 11, 2007, Available from Dr Ballard, GOVERNMENT MOVES INTO ELECTRONIC AGE: News From the Office of The Privacy Commissioner, accessed on April 11, 2007, Available from The Guardian , The tangled web of government, accessed on April 11, 2007, Available from Council beats the FTSE 100 in 24/7 services drive, Accessed on April 11, 2007, Available from UK: UK Government set to reach its e-service delivery target - almost:: eGovernment News, Accessed on April 13, 2007, Available from Ann Light , Government offers Design Tips for Local Authority Sites, Accessed on April 13, 2007, Available from Ten Years of e-Government, Accessed on April 09, 2007, Available from < http://www.authorityblog.com/2006/01/index.html> Local e-Government transforms the provision of local services for the 21st century Accessed on April 14, 2007, Available from eGovernment News, UK: eGovernment's 2005 targets: Councils hit 97% e-enablement, Accessed on April 14, 2007, Available from < http://ec.europa.eu/idabc/jsps/documents/dsp_showPrinterDocument.jsp?docID=5221&lg=en> Section 2 The policy survey, Accessed on April 21, 2007, Available from < http://archive.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/e-government/resources/eaccessibility/section_2.asp > Recommendations, Accessed on April 18, 2007, Available from < http://archive.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/e-government/resources/eaccessibility/exec_brief/recommendations.asp Government to close 551 websites, Accessed on April 19, 2007, Available from < http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/6247703.stm EU: Sixth Web-based Survey on Electronic Public Services, Accessed on April 18, 2007, Available from < http://ec.europa.eu/idabc/en/document/5706/254 --> Read More