E-envoy urges government to pull out the stops

E-envoy Alex Allan has admitted the UK government needs to speed up its timetable for the public delivery of electronic services.

Speaking to the Commons Public Accounts Committee Allan said the government was looking at ways to speed up the roll-out of electronic government.

The government is currently aiming to have 25 per cent of services delivered electronically by 2002, half by 2005 and all services available by 2008. A spokesman for Alex Allan today said the e-envoy is looking at ways to bring the 2008 deadline forward.

To achieve this goal, the government will shift the focus from getting a large volume of people using the services initially, to getting all services ready for electronic delivery.

Alex Allan also said the government will define what it means by "electronic delivery". At present it makes no distinction between the use of the telephone to access services and the use of the Internet.