Social inclusion: government policy versus reality

1
Social inclusion government policy versus
reality

• Gilian Dawson
• Faculty Information Consultant
• University of Aberdeen

Workshop Sponsors Scotia Chameleon
Books http//www.chameleonbooks.co.uk/
2
Outline

• government policies
• public and the Internet
• inclusion?

3
Government initiatives

• 2005
• e-Envoy
• e-Democracy
• access
• from PC to DiTV to Online centres
• broadband
• metadata standardisation/ layman access

4
2005

• E-Envoy (Cabinet Office)
• e-commerce (25m funding for businesses)
• e-communications (30m funding)
• e-government (1b funding)
• all government services must be online
• 2000 websites 20 government departments 480
  local authorities
• currently 4 out 480 are ready
• 157 have promotional information only
• 50 will miss 05 deadline

5
e-Democracy

• participation
• voting
• unlikely before 2005
• Interactive DiTV channel via Sky
• 20k hits a month since April 2002

6
Access

• government hopes are through DiTV
• online centres
• broadband
• competitive situation yet 30m funding
• metadata
• to enable finding of information

7
Public the Internet

• how
• who
• what

8
How the Internet is accessed

• PC v DiTV (government hope)
• since Jan 2000 use has slowed down
• 50 of UK has access (44 in 01)
• DiTV sales have slumped since March 02
• 43 have DiTV (31 in 2001)
• 32 who dont have, dont want one
• used mainly for TV channels

9
How
Q1 Do you currently have access to the internet
at a) home b) work?Base All respondents (2,028)
Mori poll May 2002 2002 2001 Yes,
at home 44 38 Yes, at work 24 22 No
access either at home or at work 49 n/a Don't
know/no answer 1 n/a
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How

• 60 of population dont own a PC
• 20 would use 1 stop shops
• 11 Post Offices
• 9 Libraries
• 5 DiTV

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Who is keen to receive
e-information Mori poll 2001

• Age
• 16-54 69 55 17
• Gender
• Male 35 Female 23
• Class
• AB 41 DE 22
• Regions
• Scotland 57 England 70
• Overall
• 29

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What
Assuming you had Internet access to various
services e.g renew car licence, which statement
best describes how you would prefer to use
them?Mori poll May 2002 Wont use the
Internet 33 Only use it if I get a reduced rate
15 Mixture of Internet and telephone 29 Happily
use the Internet services 17
13
What do they access beyond shopping online

• May 2002 survey
• 40 said they would use a government portal
• 38 would vote online (29 in 2001)
• health information 37 (28 in 2001)
• car tax 36 (32 in 2001)
• 93 have not used TV renewal service
• NHS online get 1500 hits a day
• yet 44 said they still preferred telephone
• 41 liked face-to-face contact

14
Inclusion?

• Portals
• Metadata
• Access points/training
• Preservation
• Costs

15
Portals

• proliferation
• SeamlessUK
• Peoples Network
• different functions / multi-functional
• might as well toss a pack of cards in the air
  than try to find anything on a government site

16
Finding what you need

• Metadata for standardisation
• depts already devising own thesauri
• works well in one sector but not across all
• inconsistent application of metadata
• who applies the metadata
• guidelines issued but no training

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Government initiatives

• e-GMS (PRO OeE)
• based on Dublin Core
• GCL (Government Category List)
• applies to records management, Inter/raNETs
• MIReG (EU)
• across governments
• only beginning now
• sometime before consistency kicks in

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navigating

• Plethora of channels on DiTV
• Internet use is superficial
• bouncing
• 80 of sites viewed only at home page level
• no site loyalty
• inhibitors
• jargon site organisation lack of human contact

19
Access points/training

• 8 million DiTVs
• 6000 online centres in UK by 2005
• 3000 already in England
• website claims none in Scotland
• variety of locations, costs and help
• broadband
• BT unwilling to act on less that 250-500 users
• urban-rural divide 30 outwith area
• prices cut to be in line with Europe/US v TeleWest

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Preservation

• digital is not permanent
• file format, programming language, hardware
• technology preservation in short-term
• refreshing data by copying to similar formats
• lose data without knowing it
• data archaeology the final solution
• microform to vellum
• digital black hole emerging

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Costs

• connecting to the Web is not free
• certain types of information are not free
• e-books, e-journals
• hardware costs to the public
• PCs DiTV
• personal time
• have to find information for oneself
• librarian as finder is more remote

22
Conclusions

• Government
• I have a dream for 2005
• Public
• I have a recurring nightmare
• Digital
• IT never quite matches reality

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Office of e-Envoy web site
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Questions

• How far away is the government from achieving its
  aims?
• How do we as practitioners help the government
  achieve its aims?