Half of councils will miss 2005 e-government deadline

Over half of local authorities believe they will miss the government's 2005 deadline for putting council services online, according to a new survey.

A survey of local government users by Capita Software Services found 56 per cent believe UK councils will fail to hit the e-government target deadline of December 2005.

Despite this, over three-quarters (76 per cent) said local authorities are "generally on track" to putting services online, just not in line with the government's specified timeframe.

The survey was conducted among attendees at the public sector Institute of Revenue, Ratings and Valuation (IRRV) conference last month.

Commenting on the findings, Rob Neil, head of ICT services at Ashford Borough Council and member of silicon.com's CIO Jury, said there are two main issues for local authorities – hitting the 100 per cent target for putting services online by the end of next year, and outlining the savings made through e-government.

"The deadline does matter because councils will be judged against it by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister and Audit Commission, regardless of how bloody stupid the target was in the first place. And having to detail efficiency savings in the latest IEG (implementing electronic government) return presents a golden opportunity to cut the revenue support grant if I'm being cynical," said Neil.

Neil also argued that ultimately the only thing that really matters is improving services to the public. "Sometimes e-enabling will help and sometimes it may not be particularly relevant. In an ideal world, councils would be left to make pragmatic judgements as to what is best for their local circumstances, but in the current climate that's unlikely to happen," he said.