Directgov review: call for feedback

Following the announcement that Directgov has joined Cabinet Office, Martha Lane Fox, UK Digital Champion, is leading an independent strategic review of the service.

The purpose of the review is to provide a radical new vision and strategic direction for Directgov within the context of the reform of public services and Government's drive for greater efficiency and transparency. It will consider what strategic role Directgov should play in the simplification and rationalisation of government on the web.

The review is being supported by a small group of advisors from business and the public sector, including Transform, and we’ve been asked to help gather feedback from users and anyone with a view on Government digital service delivery on how things should change.

We’re seeking thoughts around a number of themes relevant to the review:

Central Government’s objectives in digital delivery

1. Central Government currently uses its digital services and websites, including Directgov, for a variety of things, including:
• publishing content (e.g. news, information and advice),
• managing transactions (e.g. making it possible for people to buy their tax disc online)
• getting citizens views on policy (e.g. the spending challenge)
• making data more transparent (e.g. publishing details of salaries and government expenditure)

What, in your view, is the right way to organise and present these objectives in digital communications and service delivery? Should these objectives be presented together (eg in Directgov), or separately? Should they be presented as a whole-of-government view (as Directgov is intended to do for information and services), or separately? Which types of digital content should the Government be providing more of, and which less? What other forms of content should the Government be providing, and how?

Who should do what

2. What should Central Government do itself – e.g. in terms of content, applications and standards – and what would be better done by the wider public sector, businesses, charities and users?

Sharing the platform

3. To what extent should Central Government provide a platform for the delivery of digital services by other parts of the public or voluntary sector - for example, local authorities, councils, voluntary and community sector organisations?

Trends in digital delivery

4. What key trends should Government bear in mind when designing digital services?

There are two ways you can share your views:

By emailing us at directgovreview@betransformative.com
By responding to the questions on our discussion site

These routes will remain open until Friday 3 September.

This is an independent review for which we are seeking general feedback, so while we can promise to read each piece of feedback we receive, we can’t promise to acknowledge all feedback or to include it in the final review proposals.

Thanks in advance – we look forward to hearing your thoughts.

Image courtesy of: raceonline2012