NEWSLETTER - Breaking Barriers to eGovernment - Overcoming obstacles to improving European public services

Issue No3. -  November 2005

Welcome to the third edition of the newsletter of the “Breaking the Barriers to eGovernment” project, funded by the European Commission’s e-Europe 2005 Modinis programme. In addition to findings from the project’s good-practice case studies and other activities, the newsletter will contain news, information, event details and links to other relevant research, developments, information and resources. Our overall aim is to offer expert insights and practical advice on ways of overcoming obstacles to the growth of high quality and innovative uses of eGovernment capabilities in Europe.

Case study of the month: the e-Procurement experience in France

Since January 2005, French Public Administrations cannot refuse proposals that are submitted electronically. In doing so, France has made a significant step towards the dematerialisation of its public procurement procedure. Such action goes further than the recommendations of the European Directives 2004/17/EC and 2004/18 regarding procurement procedures, which foresee the exchange of information and communication by post, fax, electronic means, by telephone under certain conditions, “or by a combination of those means, according to the choice of the contracting authority” (art. 48 of Directive 2004/17; art. 42 of Dir. 2004/18). France went further by not giving this choice to the contracting authorities.

But several barriers need to be overcome when implementing this solution concretely.

First, the costs of implementing electronic solutions are very high for small contracting authorities as they have not always had easy access to IT experts for implementing and maintaining their systems. However, the emergence of mutual solutions and appropriate offers from the market are trying to respond to the very different needs of these authorities.

Secondly, the use of electronic signatures (as recommended in the public procurement Directives, see Recital 48) is very expensive for tenderers. The fact that contracting authorities are not all using the same signature platform leads to the need for tenderers to obtain (and pay for) different signatures and certificates. The French are currently adopting legal solutions to this problem - exploring the possibility of imposing, as far as is possible, the contracting authorities to accept specifically referenced signatures and certificates.

Thirdly, the procurement chain is still not completely dematerialised and the need to re-materialise (print) the submissions at a certain level still exists in order to sign them manually. Yet there is some experience of the procurement chain being completely dematerialized, and at a legal level, a significant evolution is under way:  France is adopting a legal framework to e-administration. Within this legal framework they are analyzing the possibility of giving the same legal force to an e-signature on public documents as a hand-written signature. It is also establishing the basis for supplying public agents with an authentication and e-signature tool.

Finally, foreign tenderers are not always able to provide specific French administrative documents that are asked for during a French call for tender, and their signatures and certificates are not always admitted by French contracting authorities. This issue is being debated at European level.

Currently, all these issues are being debated at national level as the French are in the process of drafting the new French public procurement Code to be adopted before January 31, 2006.  

Recent project highlights

2nd Project workshop – Legal barriers to eGovernment
The project held its second workshop on the 29th of September 2005 at the European Commission, Brussels, Belgium. This well-received event provided an overview of the project and focused on the legal barriers to eGovernment that are being explored as part of the research. In total, 16 people attended the event from academia, industry and government from a variety of countries including Austria, Belgium, Croatia, France, Latvia and the UK.

For more detailed information about the presentations or the workshop report please see our breaking barriers to eGovernment website.

For Your Diary

The workshop 'eGovernment – The Way Ahead' takes place within ICTTA’06 (International Conference on Information and Communication Technologies: from Theory to Applications), April 24 – 28, 2006, Omayyad Palace, Damascus, Syria. For details of this and other workshops please see http://www.iwv.jku.at.

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The 7th Annual International Conference on Digital Government Research is a forum for the presentation and discussion of interdisciplinary research on digital government. Interested participants are invited to submit research papers, system demonstrations, posters, and proposals for tutorials and workshops for dg.o2006 which will take place in San Diego, California, May 21-24,2006. The dg.o 2006 paper submission deadline is December 5, 2005. Please see http://www.dgrc.org/dgo2006/ for more details.

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The 18th International JURIX Conference on Legal Knowledge Systems will focus on two major themes and their integration: artificial intelligence and eGovernment. The conference will take place between the 8-10th of December, 2005 in Brussels, Belgium. Please see http://www.jurix.nl/index2.php?option=content&do_pdf=1&id=19 for more information.

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The date of the EGOV 06 Conference (within DEXA) is September 4 - 8, 2006 in Krakow, Poland. Please see http://www.dexa.org/drupal/?q=node for more details.

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More information about eGovernment events can be found here: IANIS - http://www.ianis.net/index.php?page=interest&sub=events&topic=eGovernment

A few examples:

• ATVN-EU-GP Project Conference, 1-3 December 2005, Warsaw, Poland
• eGovInterop’06 “Interoperability of eGovernment Services” , 22-23 March 2006, Bordeaux, France. Papers due for 19 December 2005  

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….and a reminder for the upcoming Ministerial Conference - ‘Transforming Public Services’ EU Ministerial eGovernment Conference [24-25 November 2005]

The 3rd Ministerial eGovernment Conference is a uniquely important event in 2005 featuring achievements and Best Practices and analyzing the future of eGovernment in Europe. It will bring together 800 ministers, officials, suppliers and other stakeholders involved in eGovernment in Europe together with top managers and practitioners from industry and public administrations. It is co-organised by the forthcoming UK presidency of the European Union (second semester 2005), through the Cabinet Office’s eGovernment Unit, and by the European Commission.
http://europa.eu.int/information_society/activities/eGovernment_research/minconf2005/index_en.htm

Call for papers - barriers to eGovernment

The International Journal of Electronic Government Research (IJEGR) is soliciting high quality papers for a special issue of the journal on Barriers to eGovernment, to be published as Volume 3, Issue No. 1, January-March 2007. 

The paper submission deadline for this special issue, 3(1), is March 1, 2006. Abstracts are required by December 1, 2005. Papers may address any social, organisational, economic, legal, international, technological or other aspect of actual or potential impairments to the introduction, take-up and support of effective eGovernment activities. For more information please see our website http://www.egovbarriers.org

On-line information and discussion

Two reports we have been reading:

eGovernment 2004: internet based interaction with European businesses and citizens. Statistics in focus. Science and technology 35/2005. This statistics in focus on eGovernment 2004 highlights Internet based interaction of the European businesses and citizens with governmental bodies. It is an update of an edition that appeared earlier this year, notably with information from the new Member States.  The figures presented are essentially taken from the latest survey, carried out in 2004. Please see http://epp.eurostat.cec.eu.int/cache/ITY_OFFPUB/KS-NP-05-035/EN/KS-NP-05-035-EN.PDF

June 2005, eGovernment in the Member States of the EU, IDABC e-gov Observatory. Please see http://europa.eu.int/idabc/servlets/Doc?id=21035

Get involved!

If would like to get involved here are a few ways how:

EC Project knowledge keeps improving
This project keeps improving and evolving. Find our continuously updated website and newsletter here. If you would like to contribute articles or web directory items, please contact mailto:rebecca.eynon@oii.ox.ac.uk

Share Ideas, best practise and case studies
We are collecting case studies about European examples of barriers to eGov. To submit a case study please go to the project website http://www.egovbarriers.org and follow the link for the inventory.

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This newsletter is published under contract with the European Commission, eGovernment Unit, DG Information Society and Media. It may be copied, distributed and used for educational purposes. The views expressed may not in any circumstances be regarded as stating an official position of the European Commission. Neither the European Commission nor any person acting on its behalf is responsible for the use that might be made of the information provided.

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