OECD Peer Review of E-Government in Denmark - ePractice.eu

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Figure 3.3 Budgetary barriers to e-government Lack of funding for e-government projects Lack of mechanism for shared/joint funding across levels of government agencies Difficulty of establishing and proving cost/benefit justification for e- government projects Lack of long-term budgeting horizons for multi-year investments Unclear accounting procedures for treating e-government expenditures 0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100% Very important barrier Important barrier Somewhat important barrier Not an important barrier Not a barrier (has been overcome) Not a relevant barrier Source: OECD E-Government Survey: Denmark. Budgetary barriers to e-government were also found to be significant in a survey undertaken by Statistics Denmark in 2004. When asked about the significance of barriers to collaborative use of data across government, 37% of all respondents said that the expense of adjusting systems to allow this was an “important” barrier (18% at State, 50% at county, and 44% at municipality level), while a further 31% said that it was “something” of a barrier. The larger nature of this challenge at the county level may reflect the particular difficulties being faced in achieving interoperable information management in the health sector (see Case Study 1), while the challenge being faced by municipalities may be related to the structure of the market for local government ICT (discussed in Chapter 6). While complaints about lack of funding for e-government are common in OECD countries, in Denmark they can be better understood (particularly at the local government level) in light of the Structural Reform process and the approach the Government has taken to financing it. A significant reason for the merger of municipalities is to increase their size and, hence, their financial resources and ability to benefit from economies of scale. Many of the people interviewed for this review noted that small municipalities have found it quite difficult to develop e-government systems and services on their own, effectively increasing their dependence on KMD, their major supplier (see Chapter 6). Most officials believe that increasing the size of municipalities will have a positive impact on reducing the e-government budgetary barriers they face. The Government has determined that the implementation of the Structural Reform is not to be financed with new funds, but instead through achievement of economies of scale, process and system efficiencies, and savings from increased collaboration and joint financing of projects. Where absolutely necessary, it will lend money to assist organisations through the change process, using a 49
fund it has created providing a total of DKK 1 billion for municipalities and DKK 500 million for counties to borrow from for one-off investments in ICT. Any such loans must be paid back within five years. Importantly, it has been recommended that any application to borrow from this fund must include a business case based on the approach that has been developed and promulgated by the Digital Task Force. Borrowing money to fund e-government developments is also an option available to State government organisations. However, interviews revealed both a lack of awareness of the availability of this e-government funding and/or a reluctance to take it up because of concerns about meeting the costs of borrowing. E-government in Denmark is also funded through retention of savings arising from e-government initiatives. An example is the Ministry of Economic and Business Affairs, which uses savings generated through application of e-government in the Danish Commerce and Companies Agency to fund other e-government initiatives. Overall, the relative flexibility of e-government funding sources available to State government organisations suggests that complaints about a lack of funds to implement e-government largely do not arise from a tight budgetary environment itself, but may be more linked to the lack of internal flexibility to re-evaluate spending priorities and reassign funds in the face of budgetary constraints. There are two other indicators that budgetary barriers to e-government at the State government level may be largely internally generated. First, in 2001, as a response to the failure of some large IT projects during the 1990s, organisations were required to present any IT projects costing more than DKK 50 million (approximately €7 million) to the Government Finance Committee for approval. Since then, only three projects of this size have been presented to the Committee; organisations have instead recast their projects to make them less expensive and, presumably, less difficult to finance. Second, development of robust business cases for e-government initiatives has, to date, been limited in Denmark (see Chapter 8 for more information). Consequently, many organisations have not been able to easily prioritise their funding of e-government projects or make convincing cases for additional funding. This problem is recognised in the current e-government strategy, and work is underway to help organisations to improve their business case methodologies. As noted above, a business case tool has been developed for use by government organisations, but it is not yet widely used. Lack of mechanisms for shared/joint funding across levels of government was also identified as an important challenge to e-government. In order to meet the Government’s goal that e-government will enable efficiency gains (i.e. by 2006 “at least 75% of digitalisation projects release resources and at least 25% do so to a great extent”), inter-agency collaboration will be necessary. There is an increasing expectation that, to achieve greater efficiencies without new funds for e-government, organisations will have to adopt more joint standards and solutions and strengthen their collaboration in implementing common applications and systems. However, few incentives are in place to ensure such collaboration. During interviews, the so-called “sow/harvest” problem was frequently mentioned as a significant barrier to e-government. This refers to the fact that, when e-government initiatives involve more than one organisation they can face disproportionate costs and benefits, creating varying and sometimes perverse incentives for participation. Again, this challenge is acknowledged by the Ministry of Finance and identified in the e-government strategy, which includes a commitment to provide financing models which remove or limit the problem, and ongoing evaluation of the need for centralised loan pools, multi-year budget agreements, etc. 50
Page 1 and 2: OECD PEER REVIEW OF E-GOVERNMENT IN
Page 3 and 4: TABLE OF CONTENTS SUMMARY ASSESSMEN
Page 5 and 6: ANNEX A: OVERVIEW OF POLITICAL AND
Page 7 and 8: OECD PEER REVIEW OF E-GOVERNMENT IN
Page 9 and 10: While it is vital that the Governme
Page 11 and 12: Finance and the MVTU following thes
Page 13 and 14: this challenge was frequently menti
Page 15 and 16: Alongside the problem of the reliab
Page 17 and 18: In terms of its impact on organisat
Page 19 and 20: and businesses. While it is not cer
Page 21 and 22: considerable strategic importance t
Page 23 and 24: government organisations are aware
Page 25 and 26: 8. Monitoring and evaluation Denmar
Page 27 and 28: Abstract There is a favourable envi
Page 29 and 30: E-government context Government pol
Page 31 and 32: The Structural Reform Between 2005
Page 33 and 34: administrative procedures. The find
Page 35 and 36: Figure 1.2 E-government structure a
Page 37 and 38: II. THE CASE FOR E-GOVERNMENT Denma
Page 39 and 40: • Creation of a competitive marke
Page 41 and 42: Abstract Government organisations c
Page 43 and 44: Source: OECD E-Government Survey: D
Page 45 and 46: Figure 3.2 Legislative and regulato
Page 47 and 48: modernisation process, especially i
Page 49: and the generally high level of tru
Page 53 and 54: outright barriers. The clearest evi
Page 55 and 56: Figure 3.5 Use of public digital se
Page 57 and 58: • Employment status: students and
Page 59 and 60: APPENDIX TO CHAPTER 3: INFORMATION
Page 61 and 62: Figure 3.A.4 ICT usage among Danish
Page 63 and 64: Figure 3.A.8 Internet access among
Page 65 and 66: IV. PLANNING AND LEADERSHIP The e-g
Page 67 and 68: The strategy notes that Denmark is
Page 69 and 70: exchanged electronically. This is e
Page 71 and 72: with even lower rankings for driver
Page 73 and 74: involvement in e-government therefo
Page 75 and 76: In addition to support for the Join
Page 77 and 78: Figure 4.5 Responsibility for desig
Page 79 and 80: V. ORGANISATIONAL CHANGE This chapt
Page 81 and 82: Structural Reform and e-government
Page 83 and 84: The Task Force has initiated a proj
Page 85 and 86: Figure 5.2 Share of documents recei
Page 87 and 88: Box 5.1 Improving middle management
Page 89 and 90: Abstract Collaboration is relativel
Page 91 and 92: Co-ordination of e-government polic
Page 93 and 94: Box 6.1 Key e-government co-ordinat
Page 95 and 96: The CRS encompasses a number of reg
Page 97 and 98: Digital signatures are now being wi
Page 99 and 100: Denmark - something that could be a
Page 101 and 102:
Staffed by employees from the Digit
Page 103 and 104:
The additional workload is connecte
Page 105 and 106:
such a framework be designed; and 3
Page 107 and 108:
schemas used in different areas of
Page 109 and 110:
• Changing conditions in the publ
Page 111 and 112:
municipalities, which might otherwi
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The current situation has evolved o
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Figure 6.6 Impacts of partnerships
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Source: OECD E-government Survey: D
Page 119 and 120:
Abstract The Danish vision for e-go
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Figure 7.1 Drivers of e-government
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• To ensure internal knowledge of
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• The lack of information and the
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Figure 7.2 Source and type of e-gov
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Figure 7.4 Constraints on demand fo
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When asked about the level of impor
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eing for one group or another (e.g.
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Figure 7.8 Use of electronic delive
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The national portal www.denmark.dk
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identification of the relationship
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Abstract At the all-of-government l
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• At least 60 percent of all publ
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External audit Another important el
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can have impacts: 1) “service cha
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Figure 8.4 Responsibilities for mon
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CASE STUDY 1: STANDARDS-BASED E-GOV
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pharmacies (e.g. referrals and disc
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Danish approach of flexible decentr
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CASE STUDY 2: ACHIEVING E-GOVERNMEN
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Estimation of benefits for both eDa
Page 161 and 162:
ANNEX A: OVERVIEW OF POLITICAL AND
Page 163 and 164:
ANNEX B: INSTITUTIONAL CONTEXT AND
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Administrative environment Organisa
Page 167 and 168:
Other State government responsibili
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− Models to support inter-organis
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ICT usage As discussed in Chapter 3
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Promotion of IT Research and Educat
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other reforms. The plan identified
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Overall, these action plans were su
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E-mail addresses for everyone Anoth
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had developed extensive practical k
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ANNEX E: METHODOLOGY Definition of
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The survey asked State and local go
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ANNEX F: GLOSSARY This glossary was
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BIBLIOGRAPHY Agency for Governmenta
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Ministry of Science, Technology and
Page 193:
Statistics Denmark (2004b), Nyt fra
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