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Following Malta’s positive performance in the 2013 e-government benchmark report exercise, the implementation of a new strategy aims to address related issues and mitigate risks, capitalise on opportunities and overcome the challenges ahead.
There is no getting away from technology; it has become an integral part of our framework. With this in mind, Prime Minister Joseph Muscat launched the Digital Malta Strategy last March which set out a vision to transform Malta into a country, which, by 2020, “will prosper as a digitally-enabled nation in all sectors of society”.
But what exactly will the creation of a digital government mean for Malta?
Parliamentary Secretary for Economic Growth José Herrera said “a lot of initiatives have already been implemented, while so much more is in the pipeline”.
Later this year, Herrera will launch a governing body that will steer the implementation of the strategy, bring about a coordinated effort across all stakeholders, address issues and mitigate risks, capitalise on opportunities and overcome the challenges ahead. Among these projects is the e-ID card solution, which was launched last February; the rest of its roll-out is scheduled to start later this year.
The Office of the Prime Minister is working on a ‘One-Stop-Shop for Citizens’, which will enable government staff to handle any service request order from its initial inquiry to the final post-delivery customer satisfaction review stage.
Driven by the objective of placing all of government’s services online, work has also gone in augmenting the number of electronic forms that are available to the public. There are now 212 live services, which were developed and implemented in partnership with local suppliers. Other form-driven administrative public services will be deployed on the e-forms platform over the coming months.
Within the government itself, numerous moves have been made to improve the technology used, including the migration of over 90 per cent of workstations to Windows 8. This has already improved the government’s security posture and capitalised on modern end-user devices, form factors and interaction patterns.
Technology is also making its mark on the transport sector and, later this year, Transport Malta will launch its e-transfers service. This solution will cater for the simple transfer of a vehicle from one owner to another through agents, and will also manage the payment of all arrears, late licence payment fees and other related fees. Two other new online services will be launched too, namely in relation to the acquisition of a learning permit and test scheduling.
Meanwhile, for those using the court system, several simplification measures were introduced in 2014, including SMS notification, an e-mailer of transcripts and decrees service, the merger of the Gozo and Malta registries, and a notification system for the service of acts by court marshals. Other related services will be launched by the end of the year.
Similarly, the government has implemented a number of social security online services and simplification measures, including the electricity benefits vouchers, which are now credited to utility bills. Citizens eligible for social security retirement pension are not required to submit an application any more.
Later this year, people who become eligible for widows pension or marriage grant or the minimum children allowance will no longer need to submit an application.
Finally, a programme aimed at optimising government websites and e-government services for mobile device consumption was kicked off earlier this year, signalling the start of an exciting phase in Malta’s technological development.