Presentation given by Craig Thomler at the eGovernment Summit

1. Open government
in Australia
Craig Thomler
April 2013

2. Who am I?

3. What is Delib?

4. What is open government?

5. • Citizens have a right to access
government documents and
proceedings to support effective public
oversight
• Citizens have a right to have their views
considered during government decision
making.
Dates back to European Enlightenment
in the 18th Century.
Traditional open government

6. Has been expanded to include:
• Citizens have a right to access, repurpose
and reuse government open data (PSI)
• Expectation that government should
develop and use open systems, sharing
them across agencies and communities.
• Decision-making should be citizen-
centric, government’s role is to
coordinate, curate views & implement
Open government today

7. The big change
in openness…
Present
Citizens are
(or wish to be)
active participants
in governance
processes and
decisions.
Past
Citizens considered
passive subjects of
governments (albeit
with some right to
scrutinise decisions
and processes).

8. Source: https://www.facebook.com/FatherPiotrWisniowski

9. Open Government is often
confused with Gov 2.0
What’s the difference?

11. Open government is the philosophy (Why).
Government 2.0 is about the process & tools
for achieving open government (How).
IMHO - the difference

12.  Using tools and techniques enabled by digital
technologies to bring citizens 'inside the tent'.
 Empowering citizens to be active participants in
government decision-making processes and
supporting them to do for themselves.
 Opening up public data for public reuse to inform
and enable new insights, better decisions and
more effective policy.
 Initiatives from individuals and non-government
organisations as well as government.
Government 2.0 includes...

14. Open Government Partnership
www.opengovpartnership.org
Principles:
• Increase the availability of information
about governmental activities.
• Support civic participation.
• Implement the highest standards of
professional integrity throughout
our administrations.
• Increase access to new
technologies for openness
and accountability.

15. 58 countries participating already

16. Government 2.0
(in my humble opinion)
represents a fundamental shift
in the relationship between
citizens and governments,
to the benefit of both.

17. Source: Sensis Social Media Report May 2012
Australia’s internet use

18. Source: Sensis Social Media Report May 2012
Australia’s social media use

19. Source: Sensis Social Media Report May 2012
Australia’s social media use

21. What about
Australian
governments?

22. In mid-2012:
73%
of Australian Government agencies
reported using social media for
official purposes
The social media majority

23. What the Australian Government is
using social media for..
Answer choice Response Share
For stakeholder engagement or collaboration 32 54.24%
Operating an information campaign 25 42.37%
Responding to customer enquiries/comments/complaints 25 42.37%
For engaging with journalists and media outlets 24 40.68%
For engagement or collaboration with other government
agencies
24 40.68%
Monitoring citizen, stakeholder and/or lobbyist views and
activities
17 28.81%
For a public consultation process 16 27.12%
For a stakeholder or other restricted access consultation 13 22.03%
Other type of activity (i.e. recruitment, crowdsourcing, staff) 11 18.64%
For policy or services co-design 7 11.86%

24. Over 1,000 online consultations in last four years
Over 860 Departmental Twitter accounts
Over 120 agency blogs
Over 250 Facebook pages
Over 300 agency mobile apps
Over 200 agency YouTube channels
At least 12 data competitions (13th in June)
At least 6 open data sites (7th coming in May)
All levels of Aus government

25. Growth in Twitter use

27. Open Government
(through Government 2.0)
allows governments to take
on influential new roles

28. Government as media

29. Government as convenor

30. Government as platform

31. Crowdsourcing

32. Thank you!
Questions? Craig Thomler
craig@delib.net
@CraigThomler
http://eGovAU.blogspot.com