Brian Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)

According to the latest EU Commission e-government benchmarks, we have improved our ranking from 17th to seventh over the past two to three years. The same benchmarks place Ireland in the top two for e-procurement services. Examples of on-line services that have been progressed in the recent past include the census information and search facilities; the on-line system for the payment of charges on non-principal private residences; the on-line application for birth, marriage and death certificates; the automatic reminders when driving licences and passports expire; payment of the majority of court fines electronically; and the on-line declaration to the Garda Síochána for minor crimes. The customer does not need to know the relevant Garda station as back-end processes ensure they are routed correctly. We are one of the few countries in Europe that has put in place a high-speed national government network to which all public bodies can connect using any telecommunications operator in the Irish marketplace. The Department of Finance is currently working with Departments, offices and agencies to develop a rolling programme of e-government projects. In this regard, Departments are developing detailed e-government plans.

Progress has been made on these specific projects in recent times. Others are being rolled out. Now that we have a public service agreement on transformation across all the main sectors - health, education and others, which are outlined in the agreement - we will be able to progress these projects and accelerate the e-government role. The collation of electronic data and the availability of data across the system would greatly enhance the delivery of our public services. In that respect, we are looking at legislative changes in the Public Service Management Act to facilitate this issue and overcome some data protection questions.

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