Good morning and welcome to your second day of the Leaders@e-government seminar. I am delighted to be speaking to you today at what is the third such event organised by the Centre for Management and Policy Studies (CMPS).

Yesterday you will have heard speakers talk about the "e-world", e-government and e-business. Today, I want to try and breakaway from the technical jargon and talk to you about what e-government means for us in government, the public and business.

I want to give you an overview of some of the structures that are already in place, and those that we are building. I want to share with you the challenges that we face as we transform the way government delivers its services in the 21^st century. I want to give you examples of what we mean by 24 x 7 delivery. And I want to do it without the jargon.

But first I would like to spend the next few minutes revisiting the Government’s vision and direction for modernising government.

You will all be familiar with the five strands of our Modernising Government initiative.

• Better Policy making
• Public service focussed on users
• Extending access to government services
• Promoting best practice and excellence
• Using IT as a vehicle to both Modernise and transform Government and it’s services.

As a government we are working together to push forward this agenda.

We have set up a network of ministers from across government. Both myself as e-Government Minister and Patrica Hewitt as e-Commerce Minister are members of this Ministerial Team.

This is in turn supported by 40 senior Board level Officials from across Whitehall and the Public Sector Agencies, Local Authorities, and Devolved Administrations forming the Information Age Champions Group. I recognise a few "Champions" here today [Bob Assirati, Stuart Macdonald, Peter Wardle and David Hall]. This group is chaired by the e-Envoy.

As you are aware, sadly, Alex Allan has had to leave his job on personal grounds, having achieved so much in such a short time. However, the government is committed to finding a replacement for this highly strategic post as soon as possible. We have already commenced an open competition to find his successor but in the meantime Andrew Pinder has been appointed the interim e-Envoy. Andrew used to be director for IT at the Inland Revenue, but has since spent over ten years in the private sector.

The Information Age agenda offers challenges and opportunities for delivering government services in innovative ways. However, we must not become so enthusiastic that we forget that not everyone is able to use new technology. Some people cannot afford the equipment, or don’t have access to the technology. Some do not have the skills to use it.

But we are addressing these issues.

The Chancellor recently announced a new multi-million pound initiative that will provide an essential step in bridging our digital divide. The new scheme, Computers Within Reach, has three aims:

• To bridge the gap between those with computers and those without, ensuring no-one is left out of the internet revolution;

The £15 million Computers Within Reach initiative, lead by David Blunkett, will provide up to 100,000 recycled computers to low income families. The first wave of 35,000 computers was announced by Michael Wills earlier this month.

The first community to benefit from this initiative will be Kensington in Liverpool, which has 14,000 residents, high levels of poverty and unemployment three times the national average.

It will be wired up in a unique partnership between a range of organisations including ICL and Gardner Systems firms, which will offer free computers to every resident in the pilot area.

9 more communities to benefit from the initiative will be announced at a later date.

Other measures to tackle the digital divide include:

• 1,000 learndirect centres by spring 2001 – 600 are open now; and 1,000 ICT learning centres by 2001; last month the first 616 learning centres were announced. Both learndirect and learning centres are part of the ‘UK Online’ brand – by the end of 2002, the aim is for there to be 6000 UK Online centres across England;

• on-line basic skills training free of charge for the unemployed;

• tax free computer loans on offer by employers;

• the Foyer Federation, which provides housing and jobs training for out of work young people, is in partnership with ICL and NTL creating 50 UK online centres in Foyers across the country;

• in Brighton, a joint UK online/Big Issue centre will help homeless people to find a job by giving them access to computers and their own email addresses;

• charities in Hampshire are bringing laptop learning to the housebound; and

• testing new forms of provision for rural as well as urban areas - for example a mobile unit driving around rural Dorset

The Government’s ambition is clear. For the UK to be at the forefront of the new global knowledge economy.

This is vital to our future prosperity. We are putting in place procedures to ensure that we create an Information Rich and not an Information Poor society.

Internet access, like education, is the new equaliser of opportunity. In the future, being part of the Net community will be a defining condition for taking part in society itself. This is why we must do all we can to bring down the barriers to connection and getting on-line.

Multiple access channels to our services is a primary goal for government. Everything from the Internet, Kiosks, Mobile phones, and Digital TV to name but a few.

Digital TV is of increasing importance to our agenda. It’s a future means of universal access for not only giving the citizen an enhanced experience but also ensuring social inclusivity for our services.

Digital TV is very attractive as a delivery medium – in that most homes have TVs. People are much more comfortable with a TV and a remote control rather than a PC and keyboard. That is why we intend to make Digital Television a major channel for our UK Online Citizen Portal.

But we are doing much more on developing structures to improve access.

A key strand of UK online is ensuring universal access to the Internet by 2005. We are creating a new network of UK online centres, where citizens will be able to surf the net, and get advice and training if and when they need it. The first 600 centres have already been announced by the Prime Minister.

We're connecting all our public libraries to the Internet with Lottery funding - the single largest investment in the UK’s library network since its creation 150 years ago. And we're piloting Internet access in Post Offices. By the end of 2002, we're aiming to ensure 6,000 UK online centres across the country.

But access is only one part of our strategy. You are all aware that government has not only set the vision but has translated this into hard targets - the Prime Minister’s target that by 2005 all government services will be on line.

Currently, we have identified over 450 services that central government delivers to the citizen or to business. Around one third of them are now available electronically. To ensure we finish the job we are pursuing the strategy on three fronts,

• Policy
• Legislation, and
• programmes

First, you will be aware of our very substantial UK Online Programme within which we are delivering the Citizen’s Portal.

The Portal is seeking to engage and serve our citizens in ways that reflects the citizen’s needs – wherever they may be in the UK, be it Wales, England, Northern Ireland or Scotland.

For the first time, the public services will be organised around the needs of the customer. This is a huge task, and it will not be delivered in one day. But the vision is to create a virtual "one stop shop" which will bring all public services together, whether provided by central or local government.

The Portal will provide both information and on-line transactions through a single personalised entry point.

A key feature will be "Life Episodes". This is an innovative approach to service delivery that will help the customer to navigate the complexities of public services at an important time of change. For example "Having a Baby", "Going Away" or "Change of Address". But the Portal must be built on a firm basis.

Developing joined-up systems working across the public sector are the keys to delivering better services that meet the needs of the citizen and business. Earlier this month I launched the e-Government Interoperability Framework (e-GIF). The main thrust of e-GIF is to lay down clear standards and policies that will apply to all of our new information systems and portals. This is a cornerstone policy in delivering our e-government strategy.

e-GIF will give clear guidance to private sector systems and set out what will be expected for connecting to and working with Government.

I want to emphasise that e-GIF is more than a set of clear statements of policies and standards. It lays out how we will work together in capturing your innovations and capabilities so that we can develop our policies and implementation approaches that are defined by today’s Internet-led environment. We also want to ensure that we work very closely with our European partners and other governments who have shown so much interest and support in this.

And of course, it is not just about interoperability. The policies laid down in the e-GIF are fundamental to our desire to reduce the cost and risk of procuring new government information systems, as well as aligning our systems and organisations to the global e-revolution.

I also mentioned that legislation is one of the areas that we are pursuing in enabling us to deliver our e-government strategy.

There is already some legislation in place. For example, the Electronic Communications Act removes regulatory obstacles for the use of e-communication and electronic signatures.

But there is more to do.

The Performance and Innovation Unit has now been tasked with looking at the issue of Privacy and Data sharing. They will seek to find a way forward on the tricky balance between our rights on privacy and the need to share information. We hope to publish the results of this study and consultation by Spring of next year.

We have produced a number of policies for delivering our e-government strategy. However, time is short and you have many more speakers waiting to present to you, so I will restrict myself to referring to just two of them.

First, our excellent report "Successful IT – Modernising Government in Action" that sets out a package of measures to help us deliver effective modernisation through IT.

Second, the very recent report from the PIU on Electronic Government Services for the 21^st Century.

The Successful IT report recommends that we stop thinking in terms of IT projects. Instead we should be developing systems and projects that deliver business benefits. Technology will be an inherent and integral feature of such initiatives not a separate add-on.

The Successful IT report recommends a comprehensive programme of improvement with key messages for delivering government projects involving IT. For example:

• In managing programmes and projects, it is vital to concentrate on how to deliver business improvements. Getting and maintaining this focus requires clear leadership

• Good leaders and clear responsibility for change are not enough. Projects need people at all levels who can deliver.
• The risk inherent in managing ambitious, complex programmes can be reduced through modular and incremental approaches.
• Projects need access to practical expertise and regular assurance that they are on track.

• We will NO longer tolerate failure.

Let me now turn to the PIU Report.

The recent PIU report, a centrepiece in our e-government drive, puts in place new incentives, levers and structures to make sure that transformation happens within Whitehall. It means there will be sharpened funding and financial incentives to promote electronic service delivery as well as a new government Incubator to develop service ideas.

The report recommended opening up the electronic delivery of government services to the private and voluntary sectors. This will encourage improvement in service quality, to stimulate innovation and provide value for money.

This strategy will also ensure that electronic service delivery is joined-up, with services focused on the needs of users rather than government departments, and delivered through a range of means, such as the Internet, telephone, digital TV, Mobile phones or face to face.

Significantly the report also recommends the establishment of an ESD Incubator – Gov.Lab – which will be a small unit within the e-Envoy’s office with access to sufficient funds to build ideas rapidly. This is a radical proposal to accelerate the implementation of e-government.

The key strategy work for e-government was published in April this year. It sets out our policies and plans for the transformation of public services. It contains crucial policy frameworks and guidance on key areas of the agenda, for example, Digital Television, Security and Authentication Frameworks, Web sites and there are many more.

By now you should be sitting there fully signed up to the vision I have just outlined to you. But there is a question that you are probably mulling over. What about the skills shortage?

And you are right.

The challenge of having the right people with the right skills in the right place to implement e-government is huge. There is massive demand across the economy for project managers and people with e-skills, and we do not find it easy to compete on pay.

Too often in the past we have tended to think that it is the mark of a ‘gifted amateur’ civil servant to be able to turn his or her hand to anything which needs to be done.

That era is over.

It has to be over.

We have to understand exactly what skills we need, where we need them and when. Then we have to train up or to bring in from outside the skills which we need to do our work.

The Cabinet Office is currently working with Departments to identify the technical and business skills they'll need to implement their e-business strategies. When we have the big picture, we'll see what we need to do. Perhaps using some of the initiatives in the Civil Service Reform agenda like the 100 key posts to fill from outside. Or developing corporate training schemes. The Office of Government Commerce is already engaged on the challenge of how we procure and manage the big IT developments we will need.

The new Central Government National Training Organisation is taking a strategic approach to the skills needs of all civil servants in the 21st Century... and e-government surely will touch all civil servants. So IT and information handling skills are high on the NTO's agenda. And this course itself is part of the reskilling story: addressing how we lead the change that we face.

This may very well be considered a trite remark – nevertheless it is true. We are living in exciting times. We are shaping the future Civil Service. But most importantly, we are at long last delivering government services to the citizen and business in a way that they want them rather than the way that’s convenient for us.

We have to be aware and address the issues surrounding the digital divide. However, we must also appreciate that some people will never want to use new technology so we must ensure that there are always face to face services available for those who still want them.

e-government is also about making the jobs of public servants easier. For example, implementing e-GIF will enable us to deliver seamless cross-department services to the public and business. This will reduce bureaucracy, improve our management systems and free up staff from mundane process duties.

Our e-government agenda is a major challenge for the public sector. The creation of 24 hour government at people’s fingertips is going to require effort from all of you as well as your staff.

So I would like to leave you with a personal challenge. When you return to your office share the visions and lessons that you have learnt over this three-day seminar with your staff. We all have our role to play in taking forward getting UK Online. As a participant in Leaders@e-government programme yours is a key role.