Meeting documents

1 THE ISSUE

1.1 All local authorities are required to produce an Implementing Electronic Government (IEG2) Statement for submission to the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister. This sets out the way in which it is proposed to make all possible services available electronically by December 2005.

1.2 This report recommends an IEG2 Statement for Bath & North East Somerset Council.

2 RECOMMENDATION

2.1 That the Executive endorses the overall content of the IEG2 Statement attached as Appendix 1 to this report.

2.2 That the Executive delegates to the Executive Member for e-gov any amendments required to improve the overall presentation and accuracy of content, in consultation as necessary with the Chair of the Overview and Scrutiny Panel for Resources and Customer Service.

2.3 That the IEG2 Statement is submitted to the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister by 31^st October 2002 subject to formal adoption by Full Council as part of the designated Policy and Budget Framework.

2.4 That the IEG2 Statement is submitted to Full Council on 21^st November 2002.

 

Printed on recycled paper

3 FINANCIAL IMPLICATIONS

3.1 Section 4 of the draft IEG2 Statement sets out the resource implications to 2005/6, which are estimated at approximately £16m. The format required that an estimate was made of the likely total cost and the sources of funding of those costs. In order to fulfil this requirement, an assessment has therefore been made of what this is, and also of the potential sources of funding, not all of which have yet been identified. As all the projects to implement e government become more certain, so will the costs and potential sources of funding for them. So within this context for the purposes of this statement, £8.4m is forecast as being applied from internal revenue and capital budgets, £1.3m reinvestment of savings produced from early e-gov investment, £3. 0m from public/private partnerships, £0.4m from Office of Deputy Prime Minister and £2.7m from other sources including various government funds.

4 THE REPORT

4.1 In 2001 the Government set a target that all services that can be delivered electronically should be by 2005. They required each local authority to produce a statement setting out how this would be achieved. The first such IEG Statement was produced in October 2001. Bath & North East Somerset had already adopted a Customer Access Strategy in 2000, and this formed the basis of our approach to implementation of e-gov. A satisfactory Statement was produced and this resulted in a supplementary allocation of £200k capital.

4.2 Earlier this year the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister issued a draft national framework for e-government (e-gov@local) for consultation purposes. In early August Guidance for production of the IEG2 was issued based on the framework set out in e-gov@local. This was compatible with the Council's existing Customer Access Strategy, but required further development of some aspects of our planning, and a different presentation of information. Further Guidance was issued in September by the IdeA.

4.3 Implementing electronic government will impact on all aspects of the Council's activity including organisation culture and structure. Development of the IEG2 has been led by a group of senior managers (e-gov Steering Group) and closely co-ordinated with the work of the IT Client Steering Group, the PARIS Project Board and the Customer Access Programme Board. Directors and Heads of Service have been briefed and consulted, and all Heads of Service have been asked to contribute to forward planning. All Service Plans for 2002/3 should include planned e-gov developments to meet the 2005 target.

4.4 The Council's progress in meeting this target is measured through Best Value Performance Indicator 157. It is currently estimated that some 55% of the Council services which can be delivered electronically are now available electronically. This is an increase of 18% on the original assessment made in spring 2001.

4.5 The Council will be accountable to the Office for Deputy Prime Minister for delivering the commitments in its IEG2 Statement and assessment of progress is likely to be included in any future Corporate Performance Assessment. E-gov will be competing against other demands on resources and it is made clear within the draft IEG2 that success in meeting the 2005 target will depend on attracting considerable external resources.

5 OVERVIEW & SCRUTINY

5.1 The Resources & Customer Service Overview & Scrutiny Panel will be considering the draft IEG2 Statement at their meeting on 1^st October, and their comments will be reported to the Executive at the meeting. They have been asked to consider, in particular, the following questions:-

Q1 Is the vision, as set out in the Statement, clear in terms of the impacts on the Council and its customers?

Q2 Are the linkages with other major Council strategies such as Accommodation, IS/IT, Human Resources expressed clearly enough?

Q3 Does the Panel have views about the criteria that should be used in prioritising developments within e-gov?

S:\POLICY\Sarah\Corp Director\REPORT\IEG2CouncilExec2.10.02.doc

This version was printed 23-Sep-02 12:16 a16/p16