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e-Government

I thank my hon. Friend the Minister for introducing the debate today, in which we are all endeavouring to give our expert advice on the thorny issue of e-Government. I also thank the Minister for taking the time out from his busy schedule, as he mentioned earlier, to visit Ochil and South Perthshire during the recess. During that visit he discussed with a group of my constituents their experience of IT and of e-Government. I believe that we are addressing a fundamental issue in this debate. If people have no ability or opportunity to use IT, they will never use e-Government services. I shall spend a few moments speaking about that matter before moving on. In the group of my constituents who spoke to the Minister during the summer, a fair number of elderly people had no first-hand experience of IT, and some made it clear that they had no intention of ever having any such experience. From experienced users we heard the well-rehearsed argument—as the Minister acknowledged earlier—that websites are often not user-friendly, and that many seem to be designed with little or no thought for the user or the users' varying levels of ability. That is important, because if we are to encourage the IT-deprived parts of our communities to dip their toes into the water, we want them to have a good experience, not a bad one that could result in their never returning. All website designers, whether in the private sector or in the Government, have a real duty to present services in a straightforward manner. That can be done; there are some excellent sites out there, but there are also some absolutely frightful ones. Access to computers was another issue raised with the Minister during his visit to my constituency. Many people cannot afford their own computer or the charges made by internet service providers. What are the Government doing to widen the availability of IT, especially to the old or disabled? Moving on to e-Government, the Minister will not be surprised to hear that some of my constituents believe that the Government do not yet match the IT opportunities provided in the private sector. The private sector sites seem to be much more approachable and inviting than traditional Government sites. I was delighted to hear from the Minister, during this debate and yesterday, about the launch of the Government IT portal, which allows access to all e-Government services from one point of entry. The Minister is aware that I have been calling for that for some time. It will benefit businesses and the general public, but we must get the message across in simple, understandable language that the portal creates faster, more efficient services. However, we must also provide human assistance for users who have difficulties with online services to resolve their problems and reassure them. There is still significant distrust of the medium in large sectors of the population. When people deal with the Government online, or in any form, they are often providing sensitive information that they hold dear. The Government's targets are, first, to make access available to all those who want it by 2005—this is 2005, and I do not believe that we have reached that point yet—and secondly, to make all Government services available online by 2005. We have heard about the steps that the Government are taking towards that goal. We have heard about the launch of the portal, which will provide such access, and I congratulate the Minister on that step forward. I hope that the move will allay the criticism made in the European Commission's Eurostat report of May 2005. However, we have a long way to go. More people visit the BBC's and The Guardian's websites than visit Government websites. Although 31 per cent. of businesses access Government information online, 46 per cent. in Australia and 96 per cent. in Sweden do so. Only 3 per cent. of the public in the UK have sent forms in online, whereas in Luxembourg, the figure is 21 per cent. I refer to what the present Minister for Europe, my right hon. Friend the Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire, South (Mr. Alexander), told the House in 2003, when he was Minister at the Cabinet Office. He said that Canada, through its single citizen portal, was the clear world leader in the field. That remark has been reinforced once or twice today. Although we still have progress to make, we are getting there. People can now report a crime online through a well-designed and user-friendly site, which is excellent. People can complain to trading standards, as we heard from the Minister. People can report benefit fraud online, complete income tax self-assessment online—if they really want to—locate childcare online, or apply to university online. I believe that over 160,000 did so in 2003. People can claim winter fuel payments online, buy a television licence online, or apply for a passport online—some 64,000 people do so every year. However, we must go further. Could we not expect to pay our council tax online? Should we not all, as patients, always have the ability to book appointments with our GPs and specialists online? Should we not be able to complete forms online, rather than just printing them out for completion by hand, which is often the case with certain sites? I know only too well from running a small business how difficult it is to keep abreast of good practice and legal requirements. I commend the DTI on its recent introduction of a scheme designed to make such information easily available to people who run a small business. I urge the Government to promote it even further, because in the small business sector, a lot of people do not know that the service exists. I welcome every co-ordinated step that we take to increase the range of Government services available via the web, but we must ask ourselves whether we are doing enough to improve access for the elderly, disadvantaged and disabled people who are major users of Government services. Many of those people are computer literate, but we must also take into account those who are not. For example, are the 6,000 UK online centres doing their job right? Are there enough of them? What assistance is there for users with special needs—people who have difficulty with a form, users whose sight is impaired, or someone who gets into difficulty? People need to be assured that online applications are the same as the paper applications that can be obtained from the post office or from another source. We must ensure parity of presentation and information. I urge the Minister and the Government to do more, at a pace. Yes, the potential is huge, but we must get it right by making online services every bit as understandable as the traditional form, or even more understandable. We have a great opportunity in that respect; the potential for growth is huge, but we must not stifle it by providing insufficient opportunity for today's customers. As I said to the Minister when he visited Alloa in my constituency recently and heard about people's online shopping experiences, this is a transient phase but one that we cannot afford to lose. We can go into any school today and see tomorrow's generations of e-Government users, but let us not miss the opportunity to help today's users.