Digital inclusion: Government 2.0

This year's general election will be the first when politicians embrace social media. As we try to tweet our way to political power, policy makers should reflect on the power of social media as an opportunity for governments to completely change the way we do business.

As shoppers we design the service we get through Tesco.com and customers' ratings influence our choices on Amazon. Through mumsnet.com and horsesmouth we advise each other online. Whole industries have transformed. The travel industry has not been the same since lastminute.com. iTunes and Spotify have done the same to music. It is a question of ‘when' not ‘if' this revolution will happen to government.

We already access some public services online - from filling in our tax returns to applying for road tax. It's more convenient for the public and more cost-effective for government. But it's not about electronic form-filling; it's about fundamentally changing the relationship between people and government.

Tell Us Once launches nationally later this year, allowing people to tell government just the once about deaths, then births, and ultimately changes of address. This is a leap in convenience, and shows different Whitehall departments can talk to each other. Most excitingly it will also allow signposting of related services, such as support for a newly widowed man not used to looking after himself on his own. Not just support from government, but from other organisations and members of the public - freeing up frontline public sector staff to help those who need it most.

People already give feedback on some public services through sites like fixmystreet.com. This should become the norm - helping people make choices, increasing quality and competition, and using the power of crowds to help government shape services.

This country is the most advanced in the world in releasing anonymous government data for others' use. Data.gov.uk is pioneering in openness and transparency. We don't need a £1 million prize, like the Tories suggested, to encourage ‘crowd-sourcing' to develop solutions. It's already happening.

We do not need to deliver all the solutions ourselves. We should do more to provide platforms to enable others to innovate, reduce our bureaucracy and empower people. Phone companies realised that letting others design applications has liberated the power of mobiles far more than their own procurement. We should learn from them.

This isn't about large or small government, it's about different government. We should empower people more: changing the ego of government. The potential is huge, only matched by the scale of change needed in government to realise it. The challenges are many - real-time feedback, openness, avoiding a digital lynch mob, upending delivery chains. But first and foremost we need to get the politics right.

Five million people in the UK access Facebook from their mobiles. Social networks are now an essential part of how younger people's friendships work. As schools minister I set up the government's Home Access programme because IT is also now as much a part of education as school uniform and sports kit. No one should be excluded from this social world because of poverty.

Digital Champion Martha Lane Fox has shown that families paying their bills online save around £520 per year. Being online improves your prospects of getting a job: searching is easier and many employers only accept applications by email.

We can't move on big service transformation, on major efficiencies or on a new set of public services shaped by and for consumers unless everyone can access them. Whether through Home Access-type schemes, increased use of UKOnline Centres, or enabling the purchase of low-cost technology.

The broadband levy will allow connectivity everywhere. This not only allows us to develop new cheaper services but it also aids social inclusion, especially in rural areas. The Tories, of course, oppose it and would rely on the market which can never reach half of my region in the south-west.

Getting inclusion right is a game-changer for governments. Those with most to gain from technology are least able to access it. Give them that power and people will be helped to help each other and help themselves.

Social media is happening and changing behaviour. The economics are compelling but are a mirage without the politics. Inclusion, openness and efficiency need each other and between now and the general election in five years time we need to have delivered.

Photo: matstc 2005

Jim Knight is minister of state for employment and welfare reform and leads the digital strand of the Smarter Government initiative

30 Mar 2010 12:41

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• Posted by kpm on 08 June 2010, 8:09:41 PM Yes technology access is essential as are the tools (literacy and technical) to make proper use of it. But your article is extremely deterministic because government cannot/should not replicate the private sector because it's a totally different world. Citizens are not consumers! Participation in Government is still elite fantasy stuff. Those on the margins could do well to participate with like minded social groups and attempt to change the structure of government from the bottom up. But elites still rule the roost. ICT is not THE solution to societal ills: quite the opposite in some respects