The Albanese government has scrapped the Coalition’s lofty goal of Australia becoming one of the top three digital government in the world by 2025 in its first digital and data strategy.
It comes just months after Finance minister Katy Gallagher warned the federal government was unlikely to realise the vision without significantly more investment in digital services, based on the trajectory set by the Coalition.
The goal of Australia becoming a top three digital government, as ranked by the OECD Digital Government Index, was set in November 2018, when the former government released its first whole-of-government digital strategy.
The pledge came in the same year that the OECD conducted a survey to develop its first Digital Government Index. Australia was one of only eight member countries not to submit any data.
In 2021, when an updated digital strategy was released, the government reiterated the goal and raised the stakes by pledging to have all its services available digitally by 2025. At that time, less than half of all services were digitised.
“It’s not just a refresh, it is a significant shift in our focus to accelerate our digital transformation within government to become one of the top three digital governments in the world by 2025,” the 2021 strategy reads.
But the combined Data and Digital Government Strategy released by the Albanese government last week contains no mention of the Coalition’s 2025 vision, which has been replaced by a range of new metrics to measure progress – this time by 2030.
The metrics, many of which are still without a baseline, include the percentage of services that are started and finished digitally (digital service completion rates) and users accessing whole-of-government platforms like myGov or myGovID for services.
The pledge to digitise all remaining federal services by 2025 has also been dropped from the strategy, even as the government works towards making myGov the primary front door to government for Australians.
Asked whether the top three digital government vision had been abandoned, a spokesperson for Senator Gallagher said: “The former government’s 2025 goal was just empty words, not backed up by any meaningful actions or investments to achieve it”.
“This strategy is backed up by real actions, real commitment and real investment in things that make a difference for people,” the spokesperson said, adding that this includes myGov, Digital ID and the “systems that support Aged Care and the National Disability Insurance Scheme”.
myGov has been funded until the end of the financial year, with ongoing funding provisioned in the government’s Contingency Reserve, though it remains unclear whether this amounts to the $100 million-plus a year recommended by the user audit.
The government waited until after the release of the Data and Digital Strategy on Friday to deliver its response to the myGov user audit, which was completed in January. The government responses has been complete since October.
The response, tabled on Monday, agrees to four of the 10 recommendations in full, such as that myGov remain the government’s digital front door. Five of the remaining recommendations, including ongoing funding for the platform, were agreed in principle, and one was noted.
Just $11.3 million over two years was set aside in last week’s Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook to implement the finding of the audit and expand myGov functionality – less than what the government has set aside to rebrand myGovID.
In addition to myGov and Digital ID, the new Data and Digital Government Strategy also commits to a lifting of the quality of services through the Digital Services Standard, which was updated earlier this month, and developing a Data Ethics Framework.
“We’re… building the in-house data and digital capability of public servants, as those responsible for the essential government services people rely on. These actions are laid out in the strategy’s implementation plan,” the spokesperson said.
Shadow minister for Government Services and the Digital Economy Paul Fletcher on Friday described the new strategy as a “deeply disappointing, dilatory, do-nothing dossier of dullness” and a missed opportunity.
“It has plenty of aspirational statements, such as: ‘The Australian government will deliver simple, secure, and connected public services for all people and business, through world class data and digital capabilities’. But it is entirely lacking in specific, measurable initiatives,” he said.
“The Albanese government desperately needs to apply a customer service lens across the public sector. Unfortunately, it remains unclear how this Strategy will achieve that.”
