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Donegal is to become the test-bed for the country's e-government strategy as several of the county's public bodies look to deliver services on-line.
 Donegal County Council, the North Western Health Board and the regional offices of the Department of Social, Community and Family Affairs and FAS are to work with the e-government agency Reach to integrate some of their services and provide alternative access routes to these services. The initiative will act as a pilot for the national e-government service and could run for up to two years.
"We want to test out the services with the public in a more controlled environment to see if this model should be rolled-out nationally," said Oliver Ryan, director of Reach. Reach is the organisation co-ordinating the government's strategy of integrating the internal systems of Ireland's public services and making them available on-line.
Although e-government is usually viewed as being the provision of public services exclusively over the Web, those behind the project say the Internet may not turn out to be the most popular means of accessing such services.
"We have to consider the level of Internet penetration in Ireland, particularly in rural areas," said Tony Kieran, project manager of Donegal Integrated Services/Reach Project. "We also have to look at whether someone who is applying for unemployment benefit will have access to a PC and Internet connection."
Kieran commented that as a result, the services will be offered through three channels: walk-in at six decentralised offices, via the telephone and over the Web. Depending on the service, he said it was highly likely that the walk-in method will be the most popular among the public. "Although we expect a lot of people to pay for motor taxation on-line, when higher levels of authentication are needed they may prefer to apply for services the traditional way."
Users will access all the services using one ID number, the Personal Public Service (PPS) Number, formerly known as the RSI number.
He added that while services such as paying for motor taxation or local council taxes will be available on-line relatively quickly, more complex transactions, such as applying for housing or health benefits, may taken some time to be implemented. "It all depends on how soon individual agencies and departments can e-enable their offerings," he told ElectricNews.Net. Work on the project began within the last two months, but it not yet known when the first on-line service will be made available.
While KPMG Consulting has developed a pilot version of the e-government system that will be trailed in Donegal, Reach has said it will put out to tender the contract to build the national version next month. As well as KPMG, it is expected that companies such as EDS, IBM, Accenture and Cap Gemini will build for this business.
Although Reach is mandated to "work closely" with all government departments, it comes under the auspices of three departments: the Department of An Taoiseach, the Department of Finance (both of whom have specific roles under the e-government strategy), and the Department of Social, Community and Family Affairs.
Reach can be found at http://www.reach.ie
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