Australia drafts five-year ICT plan

procurement and coordination agency has prioritised delivery of better services, open engagement and government operations as a means to improve ICT, reports CIO.

In its five-year draft strategic vision released this week, the Australian Government Information Management Office (Agimo) outlined the government's future use of ICT, building on its ICT reform programme and shifting the focus to productivity.

Agimo pinpointed key tasks to be undertaken over coming years, including the use of fewer government Web sites, more streamlined service delivery and a continued priority of government 2.0 initiatives, says IT News.

It says the Australian government's use of ICT should play a role in boosting public sector productivity rather than focus on cutting costs.

“ICT should be used to deliver better government services, engage openly with stakeholders and improve government operations,” states Agimo.

Agimo's document re-affirms the move to open government, open engagement, access to datasets on data.gov.au and use of Web 2.0 tools and a greater use of location-based data.

According to the document, from 2012 citizens will be able to access every government agency via logging into the australia.gov.au portal, states ZDnet.

Users will be able to provide data to this single entry point and specify which government agencies can access the data, so they don't have to enter the same information every time they wish to access a service from a different agency.

“Online services will be simpler and easier to use under appropriate security and privacy constraints. People will be able to complete transactions, when and how best meets their needs, to the extent that technology allows,” the document states.