Site map | Accessibility statement

NPP Newsletter Issue 16, May 2006

Machinery of government changes – Department for Communities and Local Government: Number 10 Downing Street has announced the creation of a new Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) under Ruth Kelly's leadership.

DCLG will be the successor department to the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (ODPM). It is an expanded department with a powerful new remit to promote community cohesion and equality, as well as responsibility for housing, urban regeneration, planning and local government. DCLG will be much better placed to deliver on this important remit.

It will unite the communities and civic renewal functions previously undertaken by the Home Office, with responsibility for regeneration, neighbourhood renewal and local government (previously held by the ODPM).

It will bring together responsibility for equality policy, including policy on race, faith, gender and sexual orientation. These functions were previously split between several government departments. The Women and Equality Unit moves to DCLG from DTI . DCLG will also be the sponsor department for the new Commission for Equality and Human Rights.

Ruth Kelly has also been appointed Cabinet Minister for Women.

www.odpm.gov.uk/index.asp?id=1165628

Local e-gov projects migration complete: The local e-gov National Projects migration process is now complete with the new receiving bodies taking these ODPM (now DCLG) initiated programmes forward for the ongoing benefit of local government.

The full migration details are:

National Project

Receiving Body

Date of Migration

Smartcards Bracknell Forest20th July 2005
Workflow PMF (Performance Management Framework)St Helens MBC12th August
LAWS – APLAWSTameside MBC12th August
PARSOL (Regulatory)LB Wandsworth17th August
NOMAD Cambridgeshire County Council2nd September
LAWS – LGOLNetLB Camden16th September
NePP LB Newham14th October
e-PAYLB Hammersmith & Fulham18th October
e-DemocracyNorth Lincolnshire Council18th October
ValuebillLondon Connects27th October
Knowledge Management - RoadmapWiltshire County Council15th November
RYOGENS Warwickshire County Council15th November
Knowledge Management - ACKnowledgeLeeds City Council17th November
LAWS West Sussex County Council19th November
DigiTVKirklees MBC23rd November
FAME Newcastle City Council1st December
ITEX (developed through NOMAD)Kirklees MBC 1st December
Pan-London School AdmissionsLB Wandsworth 21st December
Workflow Sedgemoor District Council 23rd December
CRMLeeds City Council23rd December
Working with BusinessLichfield District Council23rd December
ENCORE LB Croydon23rd December
e-Benefits Rotherham MBC28th February 2006
e-Trading StandardsTrading Standards Institute22nd March
Local eGovernement Standards BodyTameside MBC29th March
Local Direct GovDCLG 30th March

Take-Up Campaign 'Live': The DCLG's National Take-Up Campaign for local authority online services launched throughout England on 8 May. Adverts with the strap-line ‘Connect to your council' will be appearing across national and regional press, radio, online and outdoor media throughout May, June and July.

The campaign aims to drive-up traffic to local authority websites, making them the ‘heroes' of the advertising. It provides an excellent opportunity for every local authority to raise citizen awareness of the services that local authorities have worked hard to e-enable, and to increase traffic to every local authority website.

Research has already shown that there is a market for local authority web services. Citizens want services that are fast, easy-to-use, accessible 24/7 and fit their lifestyle.

The key to maximising success will be in ensuring that all local authority online services offer a smooth and effective customer journey that will encourage new users to return. The DCLG is now calling for all councils to take part in campaign work by adapting the advertising material with local branding as part of their own marketing activity. For this purpose, a free CD toolkit of creative material will be made available to every local authority in England at the beginning of June.

The following online services will be promoted as part of the campaign:

For more information about the campaign and media plans visit: www.localegov.gov.uk/takeupcampaign.

The landing page for the campaign itself can be found at: www.direct.gov.uk/mycouncil.

EXPO with a wow factor - local government looked to EXPO for Transformation, Innovation, Take-up and Efficiency: Welcoming over 1,000 delegates to the plenary session of local e-gov EXPO 06 last month, Martin Scarfe, local e-gov NP programme director said that he had been working in e-government for over seven years and had become transformed through mobile working.

“We have made a massive investment in local e-government,” said Scarfe. “However, we must now lever this investment and learn how to transform local government.

“We need to find the quick wins and the next step is to find out how officers, members and citizens can use that technology - the name of the game is using the technology we have developed.

“We need citizens to use the technology: simple things can be done just by putting a council's web address on letters and councils tax bills. We must start with the simple things and then move on.”

He cited his own authority of Newham as one which was becoming transformed by technology and was now saving £3 million - or 10 percent of its budget - a year.

Re-engineering local services

Worcestershire chief executive, Rob Sykes, then described how his 4-star CPA rated authority - that had been given top marks on value for money - had been re-engineered.

He described how the county council, six districts and other agencies had worked together to create a single front office.

“The hubs we have created changes the way we work; people now contact us by the phone, internet or face to face access.

“But if you change your front office you must re-engineer you back office, otherwise you will have no more than an expensive signpost.”

He described how the process began with social services and how 23 offices had been replaced by three high quality offices for staff, which can be used as a base for mobile working.

In addition they had been able to create number of touch points and secure meeting points across the county where staff could meet clients.

“We have re-engineered the service, have less building space and spend far less money. But what we have is much better, and the social workers are now advocates of this new way of working,” added Sykes.

Wireless and flexible

Bracknell Forest leader, Cllr Paul Bettison, said that Bracknell was being rebuilt as a ‘wireless town' and how the authority would be using technology to deliver better services.

He said: “We in local government must get to grips with e-government and transformational government using ICT tools.

“We are about modernising service delivery and using technology to help us deliver services in the most effective way.”

He said that it would be reckless if we did not use technology and described how flexible working had transformed the working experience of his staff and had both empowered them and increased output.

He said that technology had enabled Bracknell Forest to reduce accommodation space by 20 percent and saved £300,000.

E-government has been a huge success: Local authorities in England have made a huge success of the first phase of e-government, but now is the time to put ideas into practice, said then local government minister, Jim Fitzpatrick, speaking at the local e-gov celebration dinner held at the Old Royal Naval College, Greenwich in London.

And local government should be proud of the positive change it has bought about through the use of e-government, added Mr Fitzpatrick.

Praising the work of local government in developing over 1,700 toolkits and guidelines for using electronic tools to improve service delivery, he said that now was the time for local authorities to put ideas into practice and to transform service delivery.

"E-government is a great example of central government and local government working together effectively," he said.

Mr Fitzpatrick told delegates from the local e-gov EXPO 06 conference that the government's take-up campaign to encourage a wider use of electronic services by people would go live with a national media campaign in May.

"Now we must make sure that people use the services. We want people to connect to their council and to use DirectGov.

"Local government is generating the e-support that local government needs. We are now transferring knowledge and sharing knowledge and change," he said.

E-government is dead‚ long live transformation: Councils must return to true meaning of e-government and deliver greater efficiencies.

"E-government is no more - it was not an end in itself and now we have to get back to its true meaning of delivering better services to the public and greater efficiencies,” said Jos Creese, head of IT at Hampshire County Council, speaking at local e-gov Expo 06 in April.

"We have made a £14bn investment,” added Creese. “But have as yet to deliver cultural change."

He said that local government must continue with this level of investment but that councils must get more from the money as they spend more.

And he called for a greater focus to be given on delivering the services that people will use.

"E-government must become focussed into delivering better services. We must have a citizen centric approach," he said.

However, he warned that shortages of the right calibre of staff could hinder progress.

"Real change management skills are needed and they are in short supply," he said.

And he reminded delegates that the government track record on IT was not good.

"We have to do things in a different way, we need a radical replumbing,” he said.

He added that local government must be prepared to work in partnership with other organisation to deliver better services in an effort to bring about transformational government.

"We have to be real about partnerships and face up to boundary issues, we need collaboration.

"Local government is good at innovation, but change will only come with more innovation," he said.

'Buy better to deliver better services' says OGC deputy chief executive: Local authorities must focus on efficient and sustainable procurement if they are to deliver better services.

Speaking at local e-gov Expo 06, Peter Fanning, OGC deputy chief executive, said that local government could be doing a lot better in the way it buys goods and services - and he reminded delegates that the government had set the public sector a target of £8bn in savings that should be made by ‘buying better'.

He cited the case of Suffolk police, which could potentially buy fuel from six different sources - including deals from OGCbuying.solutions, the police, a buying consortia or the MoD, a county council deal or they could create a new collaboration.

He asked the audience to consider which supplier really offered the best deal. He also called for greater transparency and better practice to be used by the public sector.

Mr Fanning pointed out that OGC's research had revealed a wide disparity in the costs of people buying 17-inch monitors, for instance - with the lowest being £159 and the highest £100 more at £269.

He also hoped that authorities would make better use of e-auctions - "They cost about £10,000 to set up and bring average savings of £800,000," he said.

The NAO says that there is a potential £30bn of savings to be made from shared services/collaboration. A BuyIT report put the potential figure from such savings at £40bn. Mr Fanning said that, despite these estimates, the targeted savings from better procurement had been set at £8bn in order to provide both realisable targets and to ensure that the focus of the total £21bn savings the public sector has been targeted to find did not fall solely on procurement.

The focus of OGC's activity in eProcurement is centred on the Efficiency review and it actively engages with local authorities through board membership of the NePP and the RCEs. It is actively encouraging the use of eProcurement tools - eAuctions, the Government Procurement Card (GPC) and eSourcing - with a heavy emphasis on collaboration between all public sector bodies to source common items.

The OGC's Cross Sector eProcurement team is currently running regular, collaborative eAuctions for IT hardware that have saved in excess of £14m over four events. The next event takes place on the 24th May 2006 and will be the first collaborative eAuction event to be run under the new EU Directives.

For further information: ServiceDesk@ogc.gsi.gov.uk

New Centre of Excellence for Local eDemocracy: A new Centre for Excellence for Local eDemocracy has been announced to take forward the work of the Local e-Democracy National Project.

Launching the new Centre for Excellence, then minister for local e-government, Jim Fitzpatrick, said, “The Local eDemocracy project was set up to tackle a very important issue in our society today. We face growing problems of falling turnout at elections – and particularly local elections. Around 30% turnout or less is not uncommon. There is a general disconnection among citizens with the local political process. And they often don't understand the purpose of elections.

“We need to reverse this trend and improve the health of our local democracy – both at the polls and through wider democratic activities in our communities.”

Internationally, the project has received widespread acclaim already. It has won the prestigious European eDemocracy Award at the recent Worldwide Forum on eDemocracy held in Issy-les-Moulineaux in France.

Headed up by its new president, former UK e-envoy, Andrew Pinder, the Centre for Excellence will have funding for the next two years to take forward the important work and other related policy strands of the former national project.

The aim is for the centre to be self-supporting eventually, through developing and selling products. Its first priority will be to deliver for councils here in the UK. Then it will secure further funding by working with other countries to develop and sell products. It will also work in partnership with the Council of Europe, the European Union and the United Nations to build up a store of knowledge and research as this is a critical issue for governments around the world.

Click here to read Mr Fitzpatrick's full speech.

www.edemocracy.gov.uk

The Next Big e-Agenda Has Arrived! This summer, over 500 senior government officials from UK central and local government, international organisations and NGOs (including the United Nations, the European Commission and the Council of Europe) from over 70 countries will join with the Department for Communities and Local Government in a major new International Symposium to share expertise on the growing convergence between e-Government, Social Inclusion and e-Participation.

To ensure genuine international input from every level of government and all key sectors, the Symposium will take place in both Budapest, Hungary (26-28 July, 2006) and Baltimore, USA (2-4 August, 2006). Budapest will set the stage for discussion and debate around the critical challenges stakeholders face as they struggle to deliver the full potential of e-government. ‘The Budapest meeting presents an ideal opportunity to take the discussion on e-Participation and e-Government forward,' states the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs.

Baltimore will take the discussion further by exploring new and emerging e-applications in the country that pioneered the art of online campaigning but now faces the challenge of translating these tools into more inclusive governance.

Local e-Government is moving onto the next stage of the e-journey, by focusing attention on e-Participation and how to use technology to effectively engage and empower citizens. Strategies of e-Government have delivered the infrastructure to deliver transactional services. The next step involves utilising technology to enhance and facilitate engagement for citizens in their everyday lives.

The opportunity to use new technology, such as m-Government is being explored in the UK and overseas. The Budapest and Baltimore events afford the opportunity for officials, experts, academics and practitioners to assess the best way forward to benefit everyone.

DCLG participation at the Symposium includes workshops on the status of the UK Digital Challenge and how to promote Social Inclusion via e-Participation. It will also include the international showcasing of new DCLG e-Participation solutions such as the VOICE toolkit, a brand new suite of easy-to-use interactive tools for creating and developing e-communities where citizens, communities and authorities can come can come together online to discuss issues, work in partnership, and share information and ideas. The VOICE toolkit includes e-participation, e-consultation and website publishing tools to support the e-enabling, as well as develop existing e-enabled parish and town councils, the voluntary community sector, neighbourhood groups and other local initiatives.

The United Kingdom is currently ranked number one by the United Nations Global e-Participation Index and recently ranked number one globally in e-Participation in an index prepared by the World Economic Forum to measure an economy's readiness to effectively use information technology.

With over 70 countries expected to be represented, participation in the forthcoming Symposium provides a timely celebration of the UK's success in this important field, and opportunity to share good practice and lessons learned globally.

The International e-Participation and Local Democracy Symposium: Promoting Social Inclusion via e-Participation is a series of collaborative conferences with a number of key partners and partners. Key Partners include the Centre of Excellence for Local eDemocracy, Department of Communities and Local Government, United Nations Department for Economic and Social Affairs, The Council of Europe and the National Association of Secretaries of State. Partners include De Montfort University, Association of Electoral Administrators, Association of Central and Eastern European Election Officials, The Public Forum Institute, University of Maryland Baltimore County, National Association of State Election Directors, Politech Institute, America Speaks/Global Voices, American Association of People with Disabilities, North Lincolnshire Council, Swindon Borough Council, Scope.

www.edemocracysymposium.org

Giving a VOICE to local communities: VOICE is a simple toolkit of interactive solutions which will support local authorities in creating e-communities where people can gather online to discuss issues and share ideas, opinions and local information.

Available now from www.e-democracy.gov.uk/voice, Voice can enable a sense of partnership between citizens, communities and local authorities, encouraging engagement with each other and improving partnership working.

Empowering citizens is an emerging priority for DCLG. For local government there are two main challenges – to continually improve services for citizens and communities, and to encourage people to be more involved with democratic processes and local issues which affect them.

The VOICE toolkit includes a variety of easy-to-use, interactive tools from which users from town and parish councils, the community and voluntary sector, neighbourhood groups and other local initiatives and partnerships can pick and choose. These include web forums and discussions, e-participation and e-consultation tools, plus simple software for publishing websites for these groups. It also offers training, branding and marketing materials that can help you promote this product to your communities and citizens.

VOICE is a simple way for local authorities to enhance democracy via electronic, online solutions. For instance, a citizen who wants to raise awareness of a local issue or bring people together over a specific local issue such as community safety can be offered a free website to take this discussion online, using the forum software. For groups that already have websites, they can use a range of tools to create weblogs to support and enhance their existing e-communities.

Local authorities in Essex, Surrey, Kingston, Norfolk and Suffolk have already started using the toolkit to share documents, carry out local consultation, polls, and to create an online presence for local groups.

Anna Smith, e-government & partnerships programme manager at the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames, has already been piloting the toolkit's software for publishing community websites, with the Local Directgov Programme.

Says Smith, “The toolkit can effectively support local authorities and the empowerment of their citizens, as well as enable local authorities to meet their Priority Services Transformation Outcome commitments (G2). By using VOICE, local authorities will be able to bring vital support to their community organisations, whilst also re-engaging their citizens with the institutions of government and enhancing their role in community leadership.”

A group of local authorities and county associations of local councils from across the East of England Region have also been developing aspects of the VOICE toolkit from a regional, partnership perspective.

Tim Anderson, e-service officer, Norfolk County Council, says, “The key deliverables we have contributed are training materials for local authorities, together with advice on how to effectively market the use of websites to parish and town councils and other local groups. I believe that we have learned some valuable lessons that we can share more widely, in terms of developing a regional solution for e-enabling and enhancing e-communities, without cutting across existing local solutions or re-inventing the wheel”.

In Suffolk, the DCLG-supported onesuffolk Project, a partnership between local authorities and Suffolk police, has also been piloting this solution for helping local groups who aren't already online to build a website for free.

Adrian Lynch, onesuffolk project manager, says, “Using this software, we have already supported the publishing of 60 new community and voluntary sector group websites. We have also e-enabled or supported 50 new town and parish council websites, which equates to 15% of all local authorities in Suffolk, with a further 15% signed up to also join the scheme.”

Elaine Woods, community information network manager at Essex County Council, who has been applying lessons learned locally in Essex to help shape the final toolkit of solutions, believes that VOICE fulfils a vital role in giving local communities a voice and opening up more channels of communication and consultation between local authorities and their citizens.

Says Woods, “In Essex, we began using this product because we felt it was an effective way to make information about community and local groups available via a single web interface - in our case this is www.essexinfo.net. Over a relatively short period of time, we have been able to offer support to 139 new sites covering about 23% of all our parish councils, and an increasing number of community and voluntary groups are now showing interest too.

“I believe that these statistics are very promising in the sense that, when VOICE is rolled out across the country, many local parishes and community groups will be able to take advantage of a range of cost-effective products and services, for which there is already evidence of clear demand.”

The final VOICE product suite is available to local authorities now.

For more information on VOICE, please visit: www.e-democracy.gov.uk/voice

Are you prepared to TALK>>>? The outline vision for an innovative, online platform designed to encourage the local government family to share their knowledge and experience critical to the ongoing modernisation agenda, was unveiled at local e-gov EXPO.

Maura Brooks, chief officer (ICT) at lead authority, Leeds, said, "With a soft launch before its full unveiling later in the year, TALK>>> found the local e-gov EXPO a fruitful exercise in gathering valuable insight from those on the frontline of local government major change programmes.

“TALK>>> will be documenting many stories and experiences that have led to project successes and likewise the challenges for local government change programmes. These ‘knowledge gems' are currently being pursued in greater detail and will be released within the local authority domain when www.talknet.org.uk goes ‘Live'.

Added Brooks, “EXPO was also the ideal platform to affirm our view that TALK>>> recognises local government and local authorities are very different, and that people involved in delivering the modernisation agenda approach problems and solutions from more than one direction. TALK>>> will complement other programmes such as Product Share and IDEA Knowledge. It will be using a variety of tools and techniques to capture and disseminate implementation experiences thus helping local government change teams learn from others and accelerate their own modernisation programmes."

TALK>>> (Transferring Across Local Knowledge); will go beyond key products, manuals and reports, to investigate and publicise local knowledge and know-how to help practitioners accelerate their change programmes. It's mission is to tap into the rich pool of tacit knowledge already gained by local practitioners and make it readily available to others; and relate technical, management and cultural challenges to modernisation in a way that can easily be accessed and used by change agents.

TALK>>> has the following objectives:

“Valuable knowledge and best practise all too often get stored in individual's heads or small areas of local authorities,” said Tony Teehan, DCLG. “They rarely get deposited across the local authority structure. Given the large number of local authorities that have participated in the local e-government programme, a considerable resource of untapped insight and experience exists that, if captured, would be invaluable to other authorities.

“The creation of TALK>>> will exploit the unique character of local government to supply additional sources of knowledge in ways people can use.”

TALK>>> is supported by the DCLG (Department of Communities and Local Government) and led by Leeds City Council.

For further information, please contact John Docherty, programme manager, TALK:
john.docherty@leeds.gov.uk
Tel: 0113 224 3225

All Linked Up… Phase 2 of the Local Directgov Programme is now complete, with all 388 English Local Authority successfully linked to Directgov across a total of 312 interactions.

Patrick Clark, The Local Directgov programme manager, sent his thanks out to everyone who has been involved in the Local Directgov Programme for their hard work in completing the data collection on time and for their part in helping to make the scheme such a success.

“I would like to congratulate everyone involved in the Local Directgov Programme, whether from local government, central government or an expert supplier. This started as an ambitious vision, with many sceptics and detractors, but now it is an up-and-running system with clear benefits. Well done for opening the door and delivering a great product.”

Creating a smoother journey

The Local Directgov Programme is offering support to local authority web managers to enhance the accessibility and usability of their website and to develop a smooth and engaging customer journey that will encourage users to return to your website.

Resources available include a 4 part series of Good Practice Guidance available online and on CD for local authority web managers. The series provides advice on how to create an engaging online journey, across a wide range of issues. It offers hot tips and examples of good practice that will promote confidence in your services in preparation for the DCLG's National Take-Up Campaign which will promote local online services both nationally and regionally this summer.

You can download the Good Practice Guidance at: www.localdirectgovhelp.info or alternatively, it can also be supplied on CD, free of charge, to all public sector employees.

The Programme is also providing an expert Helpdesk with both an online and telephone support facility to England's local authority web community for any queries regarding online usability and accessibility issues. Two hundred and thirty four local authorities and 12 government agencies have already signed up to the helpdesk and made contact regarding specific queries. There have been numerous messages left on the forum, from people thanking the helpdesk for replying so fast to queries or requests.

www.localdirectgovhelp.info
Tel: 0845 603 2587

Looking Local: Access Local Government services on digital TV and mobile phones via the new DigiTV brand: Looking Local.

Information and services from over 80 local authorities and partners can now be accessed at home or on the move via DigiTV's interactive services on Sky, ntl, Telewest and 3 mobile - a handy alternative to the web or call centre.

Whether you are up in Newcastle or down in Kent, in Merseyside or Manchester you can access local government information all day, every day. With over 20% of all local authorities using digital TV and mobile to offer services and communicate with their citizens, there is a wealth of information at the touch of a button.

Looking Local is the new brand from DigiTV, the former National Project, now wholly owned and managed by Kirklees MC. Grouping all local information together on digital TV and mobile, gives the customer a more integrated service, which proves more useful. Alongside Local Government information are services from Citizens Advice and the Legal Services Commission.

Looking Local was chosen over a number of options as a welcoming face to local services. So what can you do on Looking Local? Whilst it varies from one local authority to another, examples include:

Soon you will also be able to search for a job and find out transport information.

As penetration of digital TV exceeds the Internet and mobile is at 85% with ownership across the age groups and social classes, Looking Local is attracting more users month on month. By offering these additional channels DigitTV partners are realising savings and their customers are able to access services 24hours a day in the comfort of their home as well as on the move.

3 and DigiTV launch mobile services

DigiTV and mobile media company 3 have partnered to bring local government services to mobile for the first time.

The new service makes use of the most advanced 3G network in the UK to provide information on local council services to more than 3.2 million customers on the 3 network. This agreement will see information and services from over eighty local authorities, providing a convenient way for members of the public to keep in touch with council services. With over 88% population coverage in the UK, 3 has the best coverage for 3G services.

Some of the Looking Local services available on 3 include:

More authorities sign up for DigiTV

DigiTV is happy to announce that Durham, Edinbugh and Birmingham have all signed up to digital TV and will be creating and publishing services on all platforms - and mobile - soon.

It will be particularly interesting to see how DigiTV can work with Birmingham to link up with the BBC's pilot local interactive news service in the West Midlands - more details will be forthcoming soon.

Said a DigiTV spokesperson, “Over 70% of homes now have digital TV and 85% of the population has a mobile phone. These channels are becoming more and more important in terms of service delivery. With analogue switch off beginning in only two years time, and more people wanting access when and where is suits them, DigiTV is able to help local government make the most of these channels going forward.

“We are particularly keen to investigate the mobile market with local authorities as there are some really powerful applications - both information and services - that can be offered easily to citizens on the move."

info@digitv.gov.uk
www.digitv.org.uk
DigiTV Helpdesk: 01484 416 230

News from e-Innovations: The DCLG's e-Innovations programme has launched its new Exploring Innovation website, featuring two key outputs – the Framework for Innovation in Local Government and the e-Innovations Evaluation Report.

The Framework for Innovation in Local Government has been designed and developed by leading thinkers and practitioners from the public, private, voluntary and academia sectors to engage senior audiences. It will capture the main issues to address in embedding innovation in local government.

The Framework is in its final consultation stage. You can post your comments online at: www.exploringinnovation.org.uk

Forty five e-Innovations sponsored local authority projects have now completed and many of these are now working on product release and marketing phases.

Airshare (Connecting Communities) becomes Nomad Wireless

This project has now become Nomad Wireless and aims to educate local authorities about how emerging wireless technologies could be used in bringing about transformation. This month has also seen the successful launch of the Nomad Wireless Forum.

The project received initial funding from e-Innovations, aiming to develop the use of WiMax technology across a number of London Boroughs

For more information visit:

London Connects: http://www.londonconnects.gov.uk//e-government_in_london/londons_future.cfm?cit_id=7184&FAArea1=customWidgets.content_view_1&usecache=false
Project Nomad (National Project led by Cambridgeshire County Council): http://www.projectnomad.org.uk/

Slivers-of-Time ready to roll-out to urban LA's nationwide

The Slivers-of-Time marketplace is an innovative workforce tool which provides cost efficiencies for local employers and drives local work to local people. The system is now live in LB Newham.

Over 170 candidates are actively selling their time and more than 300 candidates are waiting to register. The programme is on the verge of expanding to neighbouring boroughs. Bookings are now being made independently by several employers including departments in LB Newham and East Thames Housing Association.

Slivers-of-Time is ready to roll-out to urban local authorities nationwide.

Please contact Richard Manby for more details: email richard.manby@sliversoftime.com / tel: 0208 548 8379 or visit www.sliversoftime.com

PARSOL news

Revised e-Planning Standards – PARSOL Planning held a well attended workshop at Local e-Gov Expo on the new ‘Better Planning Services Standards – Delivery through Technology'. These update the e-Planning Service Delivery Standards published in June 2004. Consultation on the standards closed on 21 April and the finalised standards will be published in May at: www.planningportal.gov.uk/parsol

PARSOL Planning is currently negotiating further funding from the DCLG's e-Planning Division to take forward a number of projects to support the e-Planning programme in 2006/7, in addition to taking existing projects forward these include developing an XML schema for Local Development Framework consultation responses, updating toolkits and guidance notes and supporting the development of best practice for e-working.

PARSOL Regulatory Services: The success of Regalion online licensing software continues to grow. March saw the number of councils who have purchased Regalion increase to over 30, with further sales in the pipeline. Regalion is marketed and supported by Wandsworth Council's commercial partner Cintra UK. For further details see: http://www.cintra.com/uk/uk_parsol.html

Leeds To Coordinate Service Transformation Experience Programme (STEP): Leeds City Council is applying its knowledge and expertise to developing the Service Transformation Experience Programme (STEP) which will be advancing the work of CRM National Project in its new home at Leeds.

The CRM National Project had reached maturity, delivering considerable success with over 40 downloadable products. With the CRMNP coming to the end of its current phase, partners and many in the emerging community working with the project felt there was a need to continue to collaborate on the transformation agenda, particularly as the integration of people, processes, partnerships, data and technical systems can be complex and costly. This led to an opportunity in which the project could be further developed and advanced.

The Service Transformation Experience Programme is committed through local government practitioners, to developing the forward facing agenda of transformational government. It has already established a new direction in which the programme will be taken forward, through communities of practice. Included within these are; Integration (technology systems and information flows), Benefits Calculation – (specifically business cases and benefits), and finally, SPRINT (business process re-engineering and change management).

Focused on building self sustaining communities of practice, STEP will enable interested local government groups to continue to work together and share ideas and best practice whilst continually developing the future agenda for the network and each others organisations. It is intended that the main activities will be low cost, enabled through workshops, forums and mentoring.

The Service Transformation Experience Programme will bring a multitude of benefits and outcomes, including the documentation of case studies, new ideas and toolkits that can be utilised by the local government family.

Programme lead from Leeds City Council, Maura Brooks, chief officer (ICT), said, “This is an exciting opportunity to further enhance the good work of the CRM National Project through the new Service Transformation Experience Programme. In the initial transferral of the project to Leeds we have already established embryonic communities of practice. Through these, we are looking forward to working alongside colleagues in local government in helping to shape the future transformational agenda.”

Geoff Connell from the London Borough of Newham Council, who previously led the National Project, said, “The project handover has gone exceptionally well, and I am sure Leeds City Council and the community networks will facilitate a new voice to help shape the transformational government agenda at a local and national level. I look forward to supporting the project in the future.”

For further details on the STEP project contact Danny Budzak at danny.budzak@leeds.gov.uk

Existing products from the CRM National Project are available at http://catalogue.localegovnp.org.uk

Realising the Benefits of e-payments - update

The ePay National Project recently commissioned research into two emerging trends within local authorities:

The impacts of these trends were then mapped against the local authorities' key payment strategies of:

Click here to download a pdf of the summary report.

For access to the full report log on to the e-Pay website: www.e-payments.org.uk or contact info@e-payments.org.uk

Valuebill newsletter

With the sustainability phase of the Valuebill National Project now well underway, the team would like to share the latest news from around the country.

In the 5th edition of the Valuebill Newsletter, local authorities, the Valuation Office Agency, Caps Solutions, Anite and the National Land and Property Gazetteer all enthuse on the significant benefits it holds.

Please let the team know if you have news to share or if you would like to host a Valuebill Event.

In the meantime, click here to download the latest Valuebill newsletter.

barry@tuckwood.co.uk
www.newham.gov.uk/valuebill

Easy e-survey of empty homes: The Electronic Survey of Empty Homes (ESEH ... pronounced Easy) reduces the workload for local authorities to provide data on empty homes through simple extraction for the annual CTB1 survey via an XML schema, to be available shortly.

The process has already been proven in a pilot study involving Leeds MDC, East Riding of Yorkshire Council, Tandridge DC and the London Borough of Newham. This more standardised approach, including clarification on reason and period of vacancy, will provide the transparency needed to meet provisions in the Housing Act 2004 aimed at addressing housing need.

For the past three years, the ESEH team at the DCLG has been working closely with the Valuebill National Project as the data required is an extract from the Council Tax Management System. Vacant dwellings and second homes data is captured in the exception/discount codes - currently the only source of such information below LA level.

ESEH also works on the same principles as Valuebill, as it will extract data using an XML schema before online transfer.

Click here to download the first issue of the ESEH newsletter.

eAdmissions Update

By September 2006 150 local authorities (LAs) in England are required to offer an online school admissions system. This is the goal set by the former ODPM (now Department for Communities and Local Government), which is jointly sponsoring the eAdmissions National Project alongside the Department for Education and Skills (DfES).

The project, which was launched in February 2004 is being led by Hertfordshire County Council and has so far seen 58 LAs develop an online facility. The remaining LAs are predicting they will be online in time to meet the September deadline.

Says Amanda Derrick, Programme Manager for the eAdmissions National Project: “The take-up of online school admissions in autumn 2005 for 2006 entry has proven that this is a popular service channel with parents in local authority areas where it has been implemented. An online facility has so far been implemented by 58 local authorities and those remaining predict that they will be offering this service channel, which will afford the sort of benefits you would typically expect from an online service, by September 2006.

“Examples of such benefits to LAs include reduction in data input errors, time required to process applications, storage space and ultimately costs.

“Over the next few years, this is a service likely to develop, and just like Internet shopping and booking holidays online, parents will wonder how they ever got by without it.”

Take-up amongst parents/carers in areas which have already got online school admissions in place has been encouraging with some LAs experiencing figures in excess of 35%. Whilst this bodes well for the target agreed by the DCLG of 5 to 10% take-up for those LAs in their first year and 10 to 20% for those in their second, the project team will support the LAs in meeting, and exceeding, these challenging targets.

Continues Derrick, “Implementing an online school admissions system successfully, requires significant partnership working between the local authority and organisations such as libraries and schools. Where schools are involved in the admissions process they can play a very important role, offering support and computing facilities to parents/carers who don't have access to online facilities at home.”

Derrick continues: “The online admissions system is designed to afford all the benefits that society has come to expect from secure online services. A survey of over 800 parents/carers who have applied online has shown that 76% said they found it either ‘easy' or ‘very easy'. The main benefits parents/carers have reported are the ability to make changes to their form right up until the deadline date and the instant confirmation they receive that their form has been completed accurately and received.”

School admissions dates vary across the country. Parents/carers are advised to check with their LA for opening and closing dates this year for each admissions round.

www.eadmissions.org

NePP survey of e-procurement supplier adoption: Almost half of the larger authorities have made good progress with involving local businesses in e-procurement policies to date and another 25% have plans to do so.

“The National Procurement Strategy for Local Government and the Priority Services Outcomes targets set out requirements for authorities to ensure that local businesses are included in all relevant procurement policies, for the good of the local community,” said Martin Scarfe, National e-Procurement Project.

“NePP has carried out a survey to assess the progress being made by English local authorities in addressing these supplier adoption issues. It showed that almost half of the larger authorities have made good progress and another 25% have plans to do so.

“However over a quarter of local authorities currently have no plans to bring their supplier adoption programmes into line with national targets.”

Added Scarfe, “I hope that publication of this survey results will help to accelerate the pace of change in this important aspect of Procurement and e-Procurement.”

The National Procurement Strategy requires councils by March 2006 to have addressed local economic sustainability and equality issues, linked their procurement strategy to the wider objectives published in their community plan and to be involving the voluntary sector.

The Priority Services Outcomes 'Excellent' e-government outcome for e-procurement also includes a target related to local suppliers, which is, by March 2006, to have included Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) in the council's e-procurement programme, in order to promote the advantages of e-procurement to local suppliers and retain economic development benefits within their local community.

Supplier Analysis has been identified as one of the key first steps in improving an authority's procurement performance. Best practice is for a group of authorities to use an external analytics service provider to obtain a full analysis, including the identification of common suppliers and opportunities for reduction of risk to local SMEs. Supplier Portals are being planned or implemented by most authorities but there is little agreement on what a Supplier Portal should do, for the buying organisation and for its suppliers.

Key survey findings:

Click here to download pdf of full report.

www.nepp.org.uk

The Local Government Integration Practice (LGIP): The National Adapters Club has successfully migrated from the former ODPM's National Projects programme and is now expanding its activities under the auspices of Lambeth Borough Council, in partnership with Socitm. Supporting the project's transition are London Connects and Intellect.

Lambeth will be taking forward the project as the Local Government Integration Practice. The council will apply lessons learnt in its own business transformation programme to advance the deliverables from the project.

"The need for integration is one of the dominant threads in local government ICT; whether it is to meet efficiency targets by moving back-office functions to a front-office contact centre, or one-stop-shop; meeting Social Services' need for secure multi-agency interoperability; or transforming service delivery with Government Connect - they all require deep integration,” said Bob Unsworth, project manager at Lambeth for the original National Adapters Club.

“The only way to deliver cost effective integration is by collaborating on the development of standard definitions,” added Unsworth. “Many of the key local government suppliers recognise the mutual value of collaboration and have agreed to fund the LGIP's activities in the coming year."

The Integration Practice facilitates collaboration between private and public sector organisations, to define ICT common integration capabilities that can be utilised across multiple local authorities.

LGIP encourages local authorities and their partners (and where applicable central government) to develop shared requirements and employ a common integration discipline, enabling suppliers to:

Suppliers have already found the ‘community' approach provides them value by enabling them to network with their peers and customers, to arrive at mutually beneficial solutions for all.

The Integration Practice will use two key vehicles to deliver its objectives:

Communities of Practice (CoP): each CoP focuses on a set of integration issues within a particular business domain, while working towards standardised components that crosscut the organisation, thereby increasing the potential for the reuse of common definition. By combining local authority stakeholder's business knowledge with their suppliers' domain expertise and technical skills, the LGIP will deliver an effective set of integration standards that provide more effective and timely solutions at a lower cost of ownership.

The LGIP web portal: the Integration Practice will extend www.lamip.org to provide the ‘social fabric' for the LGIP, enabling the local government community to foster interactions, contribute information and share ideas.

Simon Morioka, Lambeth's Divisional Director responsible for Business Transformation and ICT, said, “In terms of technical obstacles to delivering both efficiency and genuinely customer-focussed, accessible transactional services, the issues which remain are core to the focus of the Local Government Integration Practice. We look forward to working in close partnership with other authorities, organisations and suppliers in jointly pushing this agenda forward over the coming months”.

Adrian Hancock, Socitm SIAG Policy Support Officer & Programme Manager says “The Local Government Integration Practice represents not just a re-branding of Adapters Club (NAC), but is the result of a significant series of discussions to consider how the NAC and LAMIP could coalesce to provide a useful and high value offering for local government and suppliers alike. The new venture, with a highly accessible web front end, sophisticated online facilitation for communities of interest, will maintain links with key strategic partners and stakeholders. It will occupy a currently vacant, but potentially important, space within those communities who are concerned to maximise both utility and value from their existing and new systems for the continued improvement of service delivery.”

Peter Williams, Deputy CEO from London Connects, says “the Integration Practice is an example of the need for the sharing of information in order that all parties involved achieve resultant mutual benefits and efficiencies in addressing the Transformation Government implementation and Service delivery. It is essential that this model is further extended to encompass areas as of yet not addressed and its use widen through out the wider local government community”.

Nick Kalisperas, Director for Markets at Intellect adds “The UK ICT industry leads the world in the successful development and operation of ICT which delivers reliable and efficient citizen-centric services. Critical to this success is the development of open and productive partnerships between the customer and supplier communities. Intellect believes the Integration Practice represents another important step in this process, we welcome its launch and look forward to working with all customers and supplier alike to ensure its success.”

To find out more about the LGIP, or to participate in a community of practice, please contact: LGIP@lambeth.gov.uk on +44 (0)77 8965 5508, or visit our website: www.lamip.org

Nomad – new product launches at local e-gov EXPO 2006

Nomad, the National Project dedicated to mobile and flexible working in local government, launched three new products at last month's EXPO:

The 10 page Flexible Working Guide covers all the aspects that are needed to implement effective flexible working. The guide utilises an easy checklist for project owners and managers and links to relevant detailed material identified from the mass of information and experience Nomad now holds.

“This guide will help managers establish sound plans to implement good operational practice procedures and technology to support staff operating away from permanent offices. It can be applied to working at home or at other mobile locations,” said Ian Laughton, Nomad director.

The second new product is a summary of lessons learnt, pulled together from the many Nomad and local authority case studies which document both positive and negative outcomes. The result is an easy to read, combination of experience and guidance points set down under a number of relevant headings, such as Technology Selection and Organisational Change.

The Nomad Mobile Working Village @ local e-gov Expo 2006

Featured at this year's local e-gov EXPO 2006 was the Nomad Mobile Working Village – a showcase of mobile and flexible working across local government. The village exhibits and associated seminars achieved a distinctive look and feel creating an exhibition within an exhibition.

Local authority mobile projects were showcased along with a range of supplier solutions covering the breadth of local government mobility options. The Nomad Wireless team appeared for the first time at a major event – the WIMAX demonstration was a first but will likely see increasing take up by authorities. Other solutions of note included the digital pen, SMS and mobile in regulatory services.

Some 25 invited suppliers exhibited within the village demonstrating a range of best of breed mobile solutions. The ‘tented' exhibition area housed large stands from Nomad Sponsors, Nokia, T-Mobile and Hewlett Packard along with Kirona.

Both local authority and supplier and exhibitors expressed the general view that the quality of delegates visiting stands was very good both with respect to seniority and interest.

Nomad's knowledge base can be accessed freely through http://www.projectnomad.org.uk

melanie.reed@cambridgeshireshire.gov.uk

Working with Business National Project - Regional Seminars

Having taken ownership of the Working with Business (WWB) National Project, Lichfield District Council is set to run a series of regional seminars in the early summer to share the learning from its work.

“Lichfield District Council is delighted to take ownership of the Working with Business National Project so that we can share the hard work and outcomes from the West Midlands regional project, Business Matters, which we have been leading” explained strategic director, Rita Wilson.

“We know that the concept of the Single Business Account is difficult for councils to take forward individually and our work has been focused on understanding the benefits to businesses, establishing standards that can be adopted nationally and working with CRM suppliers on the practical implications. The regional seminars will give us a really great opportunity to bring other councils up-to-date on the approaches we have developed and how others can benefit from this work.”

The work of the regional project has now reached an exciting stage with the production of Version 3 of the Standard Business Description Schema, which clarifies the minimum set of data fields which should be held to define a business and its activities. This work has been led by Redditch Borough Council, and will inform the design and implementation of the SBA across all local authorities. It has been widely consulted on nationally and is available through the ProductShare online catalogue.

Wilson added that the seminars will include the outcomes from work with Oracle, Onyx and Northgate to pilot the Single Business Account concept within CRM systems and the consultation undertaken with businesses about the benefits of the SBA.

Further information is available through the SBA help line supported by rol on 0845 456 1901 or by visiting the Business Matters website at www.wmlga.gov.uk/businessmatters”.

enquiries@workingwithbusiness.org.uk

FAME spreading

FAME (FrAmework for Multi-agency Environments) is receiving great feedback from local authorities and organisations who have been trialing the FAME toolkit. Now the programme is looking to share learning in the field of multi-agency working and increase take-up of the FAME toolkit further to improve services for citizens.

A series of FAME case studies provided by local authorities and voluntary sector organisations that have been using the FAME toolkit to address their multi-agency working issues are now available to read and download at:

This series of snap shot illustrations of FAME in action, demonstrate how the national project can assist the planning and development of an effective multi-agency environment, with tangible outcomes. Using examples from a number of different authorities, departments and voluntary sector organisations, spanning a wide range of service areas, highlight just some of the ways in which FAME can offer support in improving efficiency and implementing change.

The full set of FAME case studies are now available at www.fame-uk.org

FAME in ACTION

FAME in ACTION Andrew De'ath, Chair of North East Connects, shares his experiences of working with the FAME partnership.

Put simply, what exactly is FAME?

FAME is a solution for effective multi-agency working which has developed across a partnership between Newcastle City Council, North East Centre of Excellence, North East Connects and the University of Newcastle. FAME offers a theoretical framework and a practical toolkit to support the development of successful multi-agency working, in order to provide more efficient public services which look after citizens better. It addresses complex issues of trust, security and governance across a wide range of multi-agency environments such as children's services, health care or work with vulnerable adults.

How has North East Connects been involved in FAME?

At North East Connects, FAME is supporting our understanding and development of joined-up transformational government, across the region. As we are an evolving partnership, consisting of all 25 local authorities in the North East, we expect to hit some challenges ahead as we seek to join up more and deliver more effective and efficient services to our citizens, but FAME helps us to foresee and manage risks.

The Readiness Assessment Tool is part of the toolkit which has particularly helped us to fast track the process of building towards a successful and sustainable multi-agency environment. It is a refreshingly simple way for an emerging or established partnership to create a regional roadmap and business plan for implementing change, using a series of questions which will ensure the issues have been covered from every angle, before ‘rushing in to implement' a solution.

What are the benefits that FAME offers to local authorities and their partners?

One of the main benefits of engaging with FAME is that it can assist local authorities in their delivery of Gershon targets by providing a cheaper, more citizen focused and efficient way of sharing information between departments and agencies.

A fully joined up infrastructure is currently a major challenge for local authorities and their partners. It is complex, and currently there are no public sector examples. Interoperable systems between neighbouring local authorities or agencies are expensive and time consuming and common components are needed for identity management, trust models, information sharing, and messaging to avoid the development of multiple unique solutions if we are to collectively respond to Gershon targets. We need to reduce operational costs, avoid duplication in procurement, and minimise risk wherever possible.

How do you see the FAME project developing nationally?

Whilst FAME has evolved in the North East, following significant interest expressed from local authorities and organisations outside of the region, the FAME project is now looking to push out these resources across the UK, in order to make the benefits of the project's learning and experience within the field of multi-agency working more widely available.

Where is a good place to begin, in tackling issues of multi agency working?

Part of the toolkit which has proved particularly popular is the Readiness Assessment Tool available at www.fame-uk.org - it's a great starting point. At North East Connects, we have found that it fast tracks the process of implementing change and provides a clear assessment of progress towards the building of a successful and sustainable multi-agency environment.

There is without doubt, a real urgency in this field at the moment, as people's level of understanding of multi-agency working and information sharing is really low, and this is an effective framework which can be applied to and of use in many multi-agency environments.

Multi-agency environments should provide appropriate, human, developmental, financial and managerial assets to support both the provision of the effective technical and organisational infrastructures that are required for effective joined-up working. I believe that FAME offers a means to do this and I would encourage any local authority or public sector organisation looking to address these issues to consider how FAME can offer support.

enquiries@fame-uk.org
Tel: +44 0191 277 7595
www.fame-uk.org

Local t-Gov EXPO Spring 2007

Transforming Local Government Together - The Next Generation of Events for Public Sector Decision Makers
18-19 April 2007, ExCeL, Docklands, London

‘Technology alone does not transform government, but government cannot transform to meet modern citizens' expectations without it…. The vision… is also about making government transformational through the use of technology…' from ‘Transformational Government – enabled by technology', Cabinet Office, 2005.

Local t-Gov EXPO 07, part of the 06/07 t-Gov series of events, will provide an ongoing forum bringing together the knowledge and experience of councils, central government and key suppliers to address the Government's transformation agenda.

The core content of the t-Gov EXPO conference programme will focus on implementation of enabling technology, take up of e-services and the transformation of local government through the use of technology.

t-Gov Dates & Venues

For further details contact: Sara Clark at Revolution Events Ltd. Tel: 01732 367007 Email: sara@revolution-events.com

Register for regular updates on news and events for all National Projects