Mobile communications technologies, their potential for transforming services and their implications for local governance

February 8, 2006

Jim Fitzpatrick MP
Parliamentary Under Secretary, ODPM
Wednesday, February 8th, 2006 – NLGN Publication Launch

Thank you for inviting me here this evening to launch ‘Cutting the Wires’. Ten years ago that might have conjured up a picture of ‘The Great Escape’. Now we instantly understand it means a wireless world – well beyond the valve radio.

Indeed I was delighted to contribute the foreword. There is no doubt that mobile technologies have a great deal to offer in transforming public services. We are probably only at the very beginning in realising the potential there for local services and local people.

Times are changing rapidly for local public services. One of the biggest changes is to shift the focus from service provider to service user. It is no longer about what can be provided, but about what people need and how they want it delivered.

E.solutions offer the prospect of better, more efficient services delivered by local partners, as well as easy, 24-hour access for citizens. Services can be joined up seamlessly around the user and the interaction between user and provider becomes direct.

The good news is this is happening already. Through ODPM we have now invested £675 million and by the end of December local authorities in England were over 97 per cent e.enabled. That is a considerable achievement. What is even better is that people are seeing the benefits in practice.

Two weeks ago, for example, I launched the Local DirectGov application that allows users quick and easy access to a range of services from one log-on point. You can pay your council tax, buy a parking permit, apply for a school place, report an abandoned car or a street light not working, and find out what is on at the weekend – all in one visit and at any time of the day, or night.

The point is that local e.gov is really transforming services. David Miliband talked recently – in fact to another NLGN gathering – about empowering people and giving them both ‘choice’ and a ‘voice’. New technologies go a long way in supporting that aim.

As part of the programme, e.government has highlighted how mobile communications could be used too. One of the most interesting projects to emerge is the Digital Pen. In October when I visited Leeds I saw how powerful this could be in getting older people the help they need much more effectively and much more efficiently. The social worker just writes the list of what is needed on the tablet while visiting the customer. This is then instantly transmitted from pen to provider, cutting days out of the system.

Another excellent example is the iTex project in Kirklees. This is a low-cost SMS text messaging solution that works over any mobile network. It provides a sophisticated two-way message information service for young people. When did you last see a young person without a mobile phone?

A third example – possibly not so popular – is the Street Scene project in Norwich. Parking attendants there were already using hand-held devices to log information about illegally parked vehicles and to issue parking tickets. However they had to go back to base at the end of each shift to download data. The project means they can now synchronise their hand-held devices with the parking computer system from anywhere in the city, wirelessly. They no longer have to go back to base and they can receive messages telling them about issues arising during the day.

There are more. Project Nomad was one of a number of projects in the e.government programme. This focused on mobile working and has produced guidance, a set of ‘tools’ and ‘best practice’ examples. Project Nomad is still being funded and will produce more.

It is clear that mobile technology has a huge potential to help both service providers who need to be on the move and service users who prefer to access services that way. Many of the more vulnerable people in society need service providers to come to them. And some are simply more likely to be the move themselves. Both factors cause problems using conventional technology. Using mobile technology there is a much better chance of being able to provide the right support at the right time.

There is huge potential here for providing a better service for housing tenants, benefits claimants, social care clients and many others. Younger people in particular use mobile technology as an integral part of their lifestyle – including those with troubled lives who can easily become socially excluded. Housing, or lack of it, is often one of their many problems so mobile technology has much to offer.

As familiarity with the technology spreads up the age groups, mobile communications can help close the digital divide between those with access and those without. This is very important as we improve services and systems through e.government.

15. Added to all those benefits, there is also great scope for local government to make efficiency gains. These can then be reinvested into improving frontline services. Altogether mobile technologies and e.government applications offer a win:win:win. A win for the service provider, a win for the service user, and a win for a more inclusive society.

I believe there is no doubt that local government must grab the opportunities offered by mobile technology. Indeed, as I have illustrated local authorities are already grabbing them. We may have had a fair number of sceptics at the beginning of the e.gov programme but now it is a success story we are all celebrating. The Local DirectGov application I mentioned earlier involved every single council in England. It is a great example of central and local government working together to produce real benefits for everyone using local public services – and that’s all of us.

There is still a long way to go in realising the potential of new technologies and mobile technology in particular. We have only seen the very tip of the iceberg. It could, for example, play a key role in engaging many more people in our democratic processes and helping to build respect between service provider and service user, as well as between the many diverse groups of people within our communities.

Maybe mobile technology will feature among the winners of the Digital Challenge we issued at the end of last year. This is a £9 million fund to reward projects that transform local services and make a difference to the quality of people’s lives. The winning project must show how it empowers citizens, how it transforms services and how it delivers efficiency. It also needs to be an effective partnership between public, private and the voluntary and community sectors.

Let us hope all this is just the start of something very powerful in building the kind of society we would all like to see. I have no doubt mobile technology has a very significant part to play in that.

Thank you.


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