e-GOVERNMENT ACTION PLAN II: DELIGHTING CUSTOMERS, CONNECTING CITIZENS



Link to the e-Government Action Plan II website: http://www.egov.gov.sg

Building on the first phase of Singapore's e-Government programme, Deputy Prime Minister (DPM) Lee Hsien Loong announced the Government's plans to invest S$1.3 billion over the next three years to upgrade infrastructure, develop capabilities and further improve electronic public services.

He was speaking at the launch of the e-Government Action Plan II (eGAP II) at the e-Government Forum held on 15 July at the Raffles City Convention Centre.

eGAP II will deliver more one-stop, integrated services to achieve the objectives of delighting customers and connecting citizens. In his speech, DPM Lee explained that the eGAP II is designed with two significant trends in mind - increasingly competitive economic environment and a more sophisticated populace.

On the economic front, eGAP II will create an entrepreneur-friendly environment with more integrated services, making it more convenient and cost efficient for businesses to operate here. The social front will involve citizens, private sector experts and other stakeholders in the deliberation of government policies through the development of ICT tools that connect citizens to each other and the Government.
OASIS (Online Application System for Integrated Services), the integrated one-stop business application system and the Remaking Singapore website are pioneering efforts in this phase of development.

Staying Relevant: "…The default answer to any request cannot be to preserve the status quo, but to ask why the status quo should remain…"

With eGAP II, the Public Service will expect to see more changes to the way it works, and the needs of the customer will be paramount. DPM Lee said: "…agencies will need to re-engineer their individual backend processes to provide a customer-centred service. They must strive to make things as convenient as possible to the customer, rather than make things easy for themselves". And doing that means being prepared to change to stay relevant.

While recognising that Singapore has achieved significant strides in e-Government, in a challenge to the Public Service to remain relevant, DPM Lee said: "eGAP II is not about IT, but about changing the approach to Government. The default answer to any request cannot be to preserve the status quo, but to ask why the status quo should remain, what we can learn from the members of public, and what other perspectives are relevant in considering the issue."

For more on e-Government Action Plan II and the proceedings of the e-Government Forum, please visit http://www.egov.gov.sg.