Speech to the Public Sector Software Quality Forum

I’m very pleased to join you at this Public Sector Software Quality Forum.

Today I want to speak to you about the Abbott Government’s vision for e-government.

Citizens have high expectations of government when it comes to the delivery of services online. 

All too often though government today does not meet those expectations.

In the Coalition’s policy at the 2013 election, we set out how we aimed to change this – for example with a commitment to getting all major services and interactions with individuals online. 

With the recent announcement that we are establishing a Digital Transformation Office, we are working to turn policy into action.

What citizens expect in dealing with government

So let’s start with what citizens expect in dealing with government – although if we are honest we should distinguish between what they expect and what they want.

What they expect is to wait in line for hours; to be required to fill in multipage hard copy forms which are incomprehensible; and for the whole experience to be lengthy, painful and frustrating.

Until recently I was the father of a child attending a preschool.  This required both my wife and I to regularly fill out lengthy and extremely confusing forms in relation to the child care rebate.  It would be so much simpler if you could respond to an interactive online form.

This experience is quite typical.  Globally, governments have developed a bad reputation when it comes to service delivery for citizens – paper based forms being mailed out and mailed back in again, lengthy waiting periods and byzantine processes which are out-of-step with a world accustomed to instant, always-on communications.

What citizens want – as opposed to what they expect – is the same efficient, customer-responsive experience as they have got used to from dealing with banks, airlines, online retailers and many other private sector providers.

When a business has a commercial incentive to make the service experience as quick and easy as possible, it is amazing how good it can get.

I think back to my days as an Optus executive, watching the amount of effort the sales and marketing and operations people would put into customer communications, and the business processes – be they a call centre or online – governing a customer’s interaction in responding to that communication.

If a few seconds could be shaved off the typical transaction time, or if an additional two or three or five percent of customers could be shifted from face to face to online interactions, that was a business prize worth capturing.

In turn, you needed to give the customer a better service experience to incent them.

Just think for a moment about how much better the user experience has become as an airline passenger.

Once, users had to make bookings in the office of a travel agent, and would be issued with paper-based tickets which could take days to be processed and printed.

Today we expect to be able to book flights and hotels online from any device, anywhere, anytime; and have confirmation arrive via email instantly.

The service experience today, compared to twenty years ago, is phenomenally improved.

The same could be said about banking, about buying books or clothes or music, about sector after sector.

Government Does not Meet Expectations

But in far too many cases it cannot be said about government – in other words, government is still not meeting the expectations of citizens.

A recent report by Boston Consulting Group titled ‘Digital Government: Turning Rhetoric Into Reality’ summarised government progress as:

“Getting better – but still plenty of room for improvement: that’s the current assessment by everyday users of their governments’ efforts to deliver online services… Many citizens – accustomed to innovation in such sectors as retailing, media, and financial services – wish their Governments would get on with it.”[1]

The scale of the transformation which is needed has been highlighted by Liam Maxwell, Chief Technology Officer for the UK Government.

As head of the UK’s ‘Government Digital Service’ initiative, Liam Maxwell is charged with reshaping the UK Government’s service delivery platform to align with user expectations.

A recent blog post by Maxwell’s team describes their approach: “We’re saying goodbye to the days of government services run as huge monolithic silos. Now we want to implement government as a platform, government made from platforms: re-usable, interconnected, easily replaced components that can be used and shared by everyone.”

The question Liam Maxwell asks of each government platform is this: “What is the user need?”

It sounds perfectly straightforward, but for governments around the world, the user need is all too often an afterthought when it comes to delivering services to citizens.

The traditional approach for governments is to try to do it all in-house, and for a department to decide what the end user wants.

The typical mindset is that government should own the data and control the data within departmental silos.

At the same time, much of the business government does with its citizens is not yet online.

The National Commission of Audit found that in 2012, 50 percent of the services provided by the Department of Human Services were not conducted online. The ATO was still sending out 10 million notices a year in hardcopy.

In some areas there has been good progress. For example, myGov provides a central account linked to Medicare, Centrelink, the Taxation office, Child Support, the Department of Health, the Department of Veterans’ Affairs and the National Disability Insurance Agency services. The site has over six million registered users.

But there is much yet to be done, and Australians are clamouring for more. Recent research indicates that over 80 per cent of Australians expect to be able to deal with government online.[2]

Yet according to the Australian Communications and Media Authority, in the six months to May 2013, only 8.95 million people accessed government services at all levels (local, state and federal) online. 

This level of take up suggests that the services on offer may not be what users expect. For instance, they may not in fact be digital from end to end – after completing part of a transaction online, a user may be expected to travel to a government office for a face-to-face interview.

It could also be because the services aren’t optimised for smart phones and tablets.

What the Abbott Government is Doing

So let me now turn to what the Abbott Government is doing about transforming digital services to meet citizen’s expectations.

We set out a plan in our 2013 election policy. 

We drew heavily on lessons from the UK Government.  It has found that online transactions are 20 times cheaper than transactions over the phone, 30 times cheaper than postal transactions and 50 times cheaper than face-to-face transactions.

The UK Government estimates that moving to online channels for transactional services is likely to cut the cost of service delivery by one fifth. 

The Coalition’s goal is that by the end of 2017 all major services and interactions will be available to the public online, making government more accessible and more efficient.

The internet will be designated as the default way to interact with most users. In particular, we have set a goal that all services with more than 50,000 interactions per year should be made available online by 2017.

The availability of digital services across multiple platforms and devices is key. Mobile accessibility over smart phones and tables is going to be a key driver of take up.

A very important milestone in implementing our plan is the recently announced creation of the Digital Transformation Office (DTO.)

The DTO will sit within the Department of Communications; it will comprise a small team of developers, designers, researchers and content specialists working across government to develop and coordinate the delivery of digital services.

It is designed to address the reality that some government agencies have made good progress in digitising services that could once only be accessed over the counter or over the phone – but the level of progress from one agency to another is inconsistent.

The DTO will have a very strong focus on end-user needs in developing digital services.

Through the DTO we aim to see agencies adopting a coordinated, whole-of-government approach to service delivery – rather than what we all too commonly see today, where agencies operate in silos.

One of the DTO’s first tasks will be to ensure people no longer have to complete separate log on processes for each government service. Instead, people should have a ‘digital identity’, which they can use to log in to each of their services across the government.              

The DTO will also work closely with State and Territory Governments to identify opportunities for collaboration, including ways to make better use of myGov.   The cost of bringing a state government agency onboard to myGov will be low – as low as $50,000 – and so the federal government is going to make this platform available to state and local government at no charge from the commonwealth.

By designing digital services that are consistent and simple to use, fewer people will need to come into a shopfront or make a phone call.

As Minister Turnbull recently said about the work of the DTO:

This is going to ensure that government services are vastly more compelling, vastly more attractive to citizens, and of course it will save them time and money.

He went on to point out the bigger picture of why such a transformation in the digital delivery of government services is so important:

This is going to revolutionise the way government services are delivered. It is going to make government more efficient. It is going to drive our national target of productivity, competitiveness and innovation that will deliver us the growth and ensure our children's jobs in the years to come.

Conclusion

In closing, then, these are exciting times for those involved in software development for the public sector.

The Abbott Government has bold objectives for the delivery of digital services.

We aim to meet the expectations of citizens when it comes to digital service delivery.

The skills of everybody in this room will be vital to achieving that objective.

Thank you for attending today’s event – and good luck in the important work you have to do.

[1] BCG Report Digital Government: Turning Rhetoric Into Reality p3

[2] ACMA’s Communications Report (2012-13), p. 124

I’m very pleased to join you at this Public Sector Software Quality Forum.

Today I want to speak to you about the Abbott Government’s vision for e-government.

Citizens have high expectations of government when it comes to the delivery of services online. 

All too often though government today does not meet those expectations.

In the Coalition’s policy at the 2013 election, we set out how we aimed to change this – for example with a commitment to getting all major services and interactions with individuals online. 

With the recent announcement that we are establishing a Digital Transformation Office, we are working to turn policy into action.

What citizens expect in dealing with government

So let’s start with what citizens expect in dealing with government – although if we are honest we should distinguish between what they expect and what they want.

What they expect is to wait in line for hours; to be required to fill in multipage hard copy forms which are incomprehensible; and for the whole experience to be lengthy, painful and frustrating.

Until recently I was the father of a child attending a preschool.  This required both my wife and I to regularly fill out lengthy and extremely confusing forms in relation to the child care rebate.  It would be so much simpler if you could respond to an interactive online form.

This experience is quite typical.  Globally, governments have developed a bad reputation when it comes to service delivery for citizens – paper based forms being mailed out and mailed back in again, lengthy waiting periods and byzantine processes which are out-of-step with a world accustomed to instant, always-on communications.

What citizens want – as opposed to what they expect – is the same efficient, customer-responsive experience as they have got used to from dealing with banks, airlines, online retailers and many other private sector providers.

When a business has a commercial incentive to make the service experience as quick and easy as possible, it is amazing how good it can get.

I think back to my days as an Optus executive, watching the amount of effort the sales and marketing and operations people would put into customer communications, and the business processes – be they a call centre or online – governing a customer’s interaction in responding to that communication.

If a few seconds could be shaved off the typical transaction time, or if an additional two or three or five percent of customers could be shifted from face to face to online interactions, that was a business prize worth capturing.

In turn, you needed to give the customer a better service experience to incent them.

Just think for a moment about how much better the user experience has become as an airline passenger.

Once, users had to make bookings in the office of a travel agent, and would be issued with paper-based tickets which could take days to be processed and printed.

Today we expect to be able to book flights and hotels online from any device, anywhere, anytime; and have confirmation arrive via email instantly.

The service experience today, compared to twenty years ago, is phenomenally improved.

The same could be said about banking, about buying books or clothes or music, about sector after sector.

Government Does not Meet Expectations

But in far too many cases it cannot be said about government – in other words, government is still not meeting the expectations of citizens.

A recent report by Boston Consulting Group titled ‘Digital Government: Turning Rhetoric Into Reality’ summarised government progress as:

“Getting better – but still plenty of room for improvement: that’s the current assessment by everyday users of their governments’ efforts to deliver online services… Many citizens – accustomed to innovation in such sectors as retailing, media, and financial services – wish their Governments would get on with it.”[1]

The scale of the transformation which is needed has been highlighted by Liam Maxwell, Chief Technology Officer for the UK Government.

As head of the UK’s ‘Government Digital Service’ initiative, Liam Maxwell is charged with reshaping the UK Government’s service delivery platform to align with user expectations.

A recent blog post by Maxwell’s team describes their approach: “We’re saying goodbye to the days of government services run as huge monolithic silos. Now we want to implement government as a platform, government made from platforms: re-usable, interconnected, easily replaced components that can be used and shared by everyone.”

The question Liam Maxwell asks of each government platform is this: “What is the user need?”

It sounds perfectly straightforward, but for governments around the world, the user need is all too often an afterthought when it comes to delivering services to citizens.

The traditional approach for governments is to try to do it all in-house, and for a department to decide what the end user wants.

The typical mindset is that government should own the data and control the data within departmental silos.

At the same time, much of the business government does with its citizens is not yet online.

The National Commission of Audit found that in 2012, 50 percent of the services provided by the Department of Human Services were not conducted online. The ATO was still sending out 10 million notices a year in hardcopy.

In some areas there has been good progress. For example, myGov provides a central account linked to Medicare, Centrelink, the Taxation office, Child Support, the Department of Health, the Department of Veterans’ Affairs and the National Disability Insurance Agency services. The site has over six million registered users.

But there is much yet to be done, and Australians are clamouring for more. Recent research indicates that over 80 per cent of Australians expect to be able to deal with government online.[2]

Yet according to the Australian Communications and Media Authority, in the six months to May 2013, only 8.95 million people accessed government services at all levels (local, state and federal) online. 

This level of take up suggests that the services on offer may not be what users expect. For instance, they may not in fact be digital from end to end – after completing part of a transaction online, a user may be expected to travel to a government office for a face-to-face interview.

It could also be because the services aren’t optimised for smart phones and tablets.

What the Abbott Government is Doing

So let me now turn to what the Abbott Government is doing about transforming digital services to meet citizen’s expectations.

We set out a plan in our 2013 election policy. 

We drew heavily on lessons from the UK Government.  It has found that online transactions are 20 times cheaper than transactions over the phone, 30 times cheaper than postal transactions and 50 times cheaper than face-to-face transactions.

The UK Government estimates that moving to online channels for transactional services is likely to cut the cost of service delivery by one fifth. 

The Coalition’s goal is that by the end of 2017 all major services and interactions will be available to the public online, making government more accessible and more efficient.

The internet will be designated as the default way to interact with most users. In particular, we have set a goal that all services with more than 50,000 interactions per year should be made available online by 2017.

The availability of digital services across multiple platforms and devices is key. Mobile accessibility over smart phones and tables is going to be a key driver of take up.

A very important milestone in implementing our plan is the recently announced creation of the Digital Transformation Office (DTO.)

The DTO will sit within the Department of Communications; it will comprise a small team of developers, designers, researchers and content specialists working across government to develop and coordinate the delivery of digital services.

It is designed to address the reality that some government agencies have made good progress in digitising services that could once only be accessed over the counter or over the phone – but the level of progress from one agency to another is inconsistent.

The DTO will have a very strong focus on end-user needs in developing digital services.

Through the DTO we aim to see agencies adopting a coordinated, whole-of-government approach to service delivery – rather than what we all too commonly see today, where agencies operate in silos.

One of the DTO’s first tasks will be to ensure people no longer have to complete separate log on processes for each government service. Instead, people should have a ‘digital identity’, which they can use to log in to each of their services across the government.              

The DTO will also work closely with State and Territory Governments to identify opportunities for collaboration, including ways to make better use of myGov.   The cost of bringing a state government agency onboard to myGov will be low – as low as $50,000 – and so the federal government is going to make this platform available to state and local government at no charge from the commonwealth.

By designing digital services that are consistent and simple to use, fewer people will need to come into a shopfront or make a phone call.

As Minister Turnbull recently said about the work of the DTO:

This is going to ensure that government services are vastly more compelling, vastly more attractive to citizens, and of course it will save them time and money.

He went on to point out the bigger picture of why such a transformation in the digital delivery of government services is so important:

This is going to revolutionise the way government services are delivered. It is going to make government more efficient. It is going to drive our national target of productivity, competitiveness and innovation that will deliver us the growth and ensure our children's jobs in the years to come.

Conclusion

In closing, then, these are exciting times for those involved in software development for the public sector.

The Abbott Government has bold objectives for the delivery of digital services.

We aim to meet the expectations of citizens when it comes to digital service delivery.

The skills of everybody in this room will be vital to achieving that objective.

Thank you for attending today’s event – and good luck in the important work you have to do.

[1] BCG Report Digital Government: Turning Rhetoric Into Reality p3

[2] ACMA’s Communications Report (2012-13), p. 124