E-route to birth, death and taxes

By PETER GRIFFIN technology writer

International efforts have shown that bringing the Government online is a mammoth task.

But with a strategy on the table, New Zealanders are on the track to using the internet as the dominant means of dealing with the Government by 2004.

Speaking last week at the Government Information Systems Managers' Forum in Wellington, State Services Minister Trevor Mallard promised a Government portal more user-friendly that the existing site, www.govt.nz.

At the new public interface, it will matter little if citizens do not know which Government department they need to approach - they can rely on easy web navigation.

Within three years everyone will be able to pay taxes and bills, or register new companies and births, marriages and deaths via a single "portal" website.

And most public sector buying will go through an e-procurement portal linking all Government departments with their suppliers.

That is the master plan, drafted on the steps of Parliament during a fire drill just over a year ago.

Tests of the final system will begin next month and a completed system is nearly a year away.

"There's some basic stuff where I think we can make enormous progress in making the lives of citizens easier," said Mr Mallard. "The portal will be the centrepiece of e-government.

"It will begin to integrate more across traditional government boundaries."

A general timetable for getting services online was released two weeks ago.

But Mr Mallard is not making the same mistake made by British Prime Minister Tony Blair by setting fixed dates for putting services online and then struggling to meet them.

"We'll be doing a six-monthly update rollover," he said.

"We started with four- and five-year strategies, but we realised the world is changing far too rapidly for that."

Running in tandem with the development of the e-government portal for citizens will be an e-procurement portal, an online marketplace through which all Government departments will eventually make their purchasing transactions.

Brendan Boyle, director of the E-Government Unit, said six to eight Government agencies would help test the planned e-procurement portal from August.

Large departments such as Inland Revenue and Work and Income were likely to be involved.

Mr Boyle said the portal would also be fully compatible with similar portals being developed by Australia.

As far as the portal was concerned, the two countries would be viewed as a single domestic market.

The Defence Force and the police already have e-procurement systems, provided by software developer SAP.

The two departments will be integrated into the overall portal.

The Government departments frequented most by citizens and businesses should become more accessible.

Inland Revenue is pushing to reduce compliance costs and paperwork for taxpayers, and plans to let customers of the main banks pay their tax bills through the internet.

And all tax forms will eventually be available online.

The Government's designated banker, WestpacTrust, already lets its customers make tax payments through its website.

Inland Revenue says: "Customers will be able to link to this service via the Inland Revenue website or through their bank website when they are paying their bills.

"It is possible that additional trading banks will be offering this option by the end of the year.

"Information technology provides new opportunities for tax simplification in areas such as the calculation of tax owing, filing tax returns and making payments.

"With the help of information technology, it may be possible for businesses to file tax returns at times more convenient to them - for example, some businesses may prefer to provide tax payment information on a weekly rather than monthly basis."

Some IRD services are already available electronically.

Tax forms can be sent to agents on CD-Rom, and IRD's automated telephone service, INFOexpress, gives secure access to personal information using a PIN number.

Employers can file employer monthly schedules electronically using Inland Revenue's ir-File system.

They can either submit their monthly PAYE schedules electronically to a secure website or let Inland Revenue upload the data.

Once the employer submits a schedule, a receipt is provided and the data is transferred to Inland Revenue's main processing system.

Inland Revenue claims it will make improvements to the system and projects growth of 10 per cent a year in the number of participating employers.

A revamp of the IRD website is expected to be completed by July and "look-up" directories and calculators will be added over the next year.

Business is welcoming the move.

Michael Burgess, executive officer at the Employers and Manufacturers Association, said moves such as that being made by the IRD should help to save small businesses money, but they would need to prepare technologically for the changes.

"It should help to reduce the costs of doing business, but a lot of the small businesses are not up with the play online ... A lot of them are using dated equipment."

The Parliamentary Counsel Office said this week it was joining IT company Unisys in a project aimed at providing free online access to legislation.

The office has been working to make legislation available online since 1999 and consumer groups such as the Citizens Advice Bureau love the idea.

Attorney-General Margaret Wilson said:

"The project will provide access to New Zealand legislation in a convenient, cost-effective way, and will make citizens better informed and better able to participate in government."

Whatever the final shape of e-government efforts, New Zealand has a considerable "second-mover" advantage.

The Government has been closely studying the the way other governments have used the web, learning from their mistakes and borrowing ideas that have worked in places with far larger administrations and populations.

Britain and Singapore have caught Mr Mallard's attention.

Singapore's user-friendly "eCitizen Central" portal displays Government services according to stages of citizens' lives, from birth registration through to job-seeking, starting businesses and retirement.

A similar but less successful system is used by British citizens who can choose various "life episodes" online to ease navigation of the Government site.

The Government is also eyeing an e-procurement portal developed by Canada.

But a report published recently by research group Forrester gave the British Government's much-publicised plans for e-government the thumbs down.

Forrester claims the move to move services online is not working and is jeopardising the £3.7 billion ($12.3 billion) in savings it is claimed e-government will bring.

Microsoft is playing a big role in Britain's e-government plans, which are being watched closely in Wellington.

Dubbed the Government Gateway, the Microsoft.NET Enterprise Server acts as the centralised registration service for all e-government services in Britain.

The Government portal, the centre of Tony Blair's plan to put all Government transactions online by 2005, is designed to connect the 200 central and 482 local government institutions with Britain's 60 million citizens and 3 million businesses.

The first phase of Britain's Government Gateway project, which is already live, delivers three primary transactions - end of year submissions for the Inland Revenue PAYE, Customs and Excise VAT (Value Added Tax) returns and Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, farmers' EU subsidy claims.

Eventually, British citizens will experience Government interactions much more seamlessly.

Proposed online transactions include registering newborn children, applying for passports and visas, and registering automobiles.

Links


NZ Government Online

Britain's Government Gateway

eCitizen Singapore

WestpacTrust

IRD Tax Policy

NZ's e-Government