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The Malta Independent | Thursday 25 June 2015
Malta reconfirmed leader in eGovernment services Malta has just been reconfirmed leader in the delivery and performance of eGovernment services amongst 33 countries (28 European Union member states together with Iceland, Norway, Serbia, Switzerland and Turkey). The results were published in the eGovernment Benchmark Report 2015 issued earlier today by the European Commission. The benchmarking study carried out by Capgemini, IDC, Sogeti and the Politecnico di Milano measures four top-level indicators as well as compares the performance of eGovernment services between the participating countries. As in last year, Malta has again attained an exceptional result by leading in all the top-level indicators and ranking first in the overall results. “Malta has the highest User Centricity score for both types of life events (LE), attaining 94.5% for businesses and 95% for citizens.” (Source: European Commission (2015), Future-proofing eGovernment for the Digital Single Market – Background Report, p.21) The first indicator is User Centricity, where the report measures the online ‘availability’ and ‘usability’ of eGovernment services. Online availability assesses the existence of an electronic channel for public services, whilst online usability measures the overall user experience by assessing usability (such as support, help and feedback), ease and speed of use. Malta has ranked first in both measurements and also in the overall indicator, with a score of 95%, 22 percentage points more than the EU average. “Only Malta has good scores on all aspects of transparency.” (Source: European Commission (2015), Future-proofing eGovernment for the Digital Single Market – Background Report, p.46) The second indicator, Transparency, examines the extent to which governments are transparent about their own responsibilities and performance, the service delivery process, and the personal data involved. The EU average score in this indicator is 51%; Malta is clearly ahead of all other participating countries with a score of 97%. “... for cross-border citizen services we find 4 top-performing countries (Estonia, Malta, Finland and Ireland – the latter being a new entry) in the top performance group” (Source: European Commission (2015), Future-proofing eGovernment for the Digital Single Market – Insight Report), p.28) The third indicator, Cross Border Mobility, assesses governments’ ability to provide businesses and citizens seamless access to online public services when they are away from their home country. Once again, Malta leads the rankings with an overall score of 88%,
Roderick Spiteri
Roderick Spiteri is Marketing and Communications Manager at MITA and editor of Malta Independent ICT feature 37.5 percentage points more than the EU average. Malta is also leading in the fourth indicator Key Enablers which measures the availability of a number of technical elements which are deemed important for the delivery of eGovernment services. Malta achieved an overall score of 97%, 47 percentage points more than the EU average. Hon José Herrera, Parliamentary Secretary for Competitiveness and Economic Growth said that such positive results continue to reaffirm the Government’s strong commitment towards the harnessing of ICT to produce innovative, sustainable and secure eGovernment services. “The Digital Malta Strategy which was launched by Government last year, sets out a path how ICT can make a significant contribution towards sustainable economic and productivity growth as well as citizen empowerment” added Hon Herrera. Mr Tony Sultana, Executive Chairman of the Malta Information Technology Agency (MITA), the agency responsible for eGovernment in Malta, welcomed these excellent results. Mr Sultana stated that MITA is already addressing a number of recommendations highlighted by the European Commission, in its reports, on aspects that go beyond the benchmarking exercise. MITA has launched a number of initiatives aimed at further increasing the accessibility of public service websites. “In line with the Digital Malta Strategy, MITA is carrying out an extensive overhaul of the Government websites to improve their adaptability on mobile devices, thus catering for the ever increasing number of users who are accessing the internet from their mobile devices.” Mr Sultana also noted that the European Commission has called for increased efforts in communications to raise awareness about the availability of online services. “Earlier this year, MITA has embarked on an EU funded project with the aim of increasing the uptake of eGovernment services. As part of this project a research amongst citizens was conducted on their use of eGovernment services, training was given to public officials and an awareness campaign on a number of online public services is currently underway,” concluded Mr Sultana. The eGovernment Benchmark Report 2015 is available at: www.bit.ly/EUeGovBenchmark15
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The Malta Independent | Thursday 25 June 2015
The Malta Independent ICT Feature
O
ne of MITA’s roles is to focus on services that deliver tangible improvements and enable Malta to improve as a digital nation. Today we will look at one of MITA’s clients – Transport Malta. In an interview with one of MITA’s solutions architect we discover how she has progressed in her
career and how she has witnessed and assisted in the development of various information systems for Transport Malta. Today we also look at the latest EU eGovernment benchmarking report published last Tuesday by the European Commission in which Malta was confirmed as the leader amongst 33
countries. We look at the different indicators measured and how Malta ranked in each of them. We also look at one of the sideeffects that mobile penetration is having on the way we shop. A recent study found that the majority of us are using our mobile devices to assist us in our shopping; either before the actual
shopping or even at the store. All ICT Features are available on www.mita.gov.mt/ictfeature
The use of ICT within the Land Transport sector Figure 1 - User Centricity (Source: European Commission (2015), Future-proofing eGovernment for the Digital Single Market – Background Report, p.21)
Figure 2 - Transparency (Source: European Commission (2015), Future-proofing eGovernment for the Digital Single Market – Background Report, p.28)
Figure 3 - Key Enablers (Source: European Commission (2015), Future-proofing eGovernment for the Digital Single Market – Background Report, p.37)
Katia Desira is a Solutions Architect at MITA who works in delivering IT systems, whilst providing support and consultancy services to Government on land transport. In this interview we’ll get an overview of Katia’s work experience within the MITA transport team and how the systems evolved along the years. How long have you been at MITA? I started working at MITA as a student when I was reading my degree in BSc IT. At the time we were 15 students and the best five out of us were offered a full time job after finishing the degree. I’m proud to say that I was one of them. My full time employment with the Agency started in July 2004 as a software developer. Since then my role changed however, for a number of reasons, I remained with the transport team. Amongst other tasks, the focus was to build new modern technology systems for the transport sector so that they could replace older systems which were on the verge of being obsolete. The projects that we were working on as a team were related to an online system to address citizens as well as to offline systems for Transport Malta. These were the e-Vehicle Registration and Administration website known as eVera, the Vehicle Registration and Administration system (VERA) and the Vehicle Road Worthiness system (VRTS). How has your career developed within MITA? I spent seven years as a software developer. Shortly after being engaged as a full time worker with MITA, I was offered the possibility to be partly sponsored to read a masters degree in IT and Management. Being so thirsty for knowledge, I immediately started this distance learning course of studies with Sheffield Hallam University as a part-time student. After that I became Associate Consultant and following a career progression
framework I was offered to choose between becoming a Project Leader or a Solutions Architect. It was late last year that I decided to opt for the latter role. What I thought was a tough decision turned out to be the best option for me since I’m furthering and nourishing my knowledge in networking, databases and other key areas in ICT. How have you seen the different systems evolve in this decade? eVera is a platform that offers a good number of services to citizens. On accessing the site www.licenzji-vetturi.gov.mt one can see the list of services being offered. These consist of the renewal of the vehicle road licence including the payment of contraventions and CVA fees if any, check the next VRT due date, check any pending fees, renew the permit to access the capital city, and also apply to receive SMS notifications when the vehicle road licence and VRT test are due. The services offered are regularly enhanced according to the needs of the citizen. A part of eVera is only accessible to a number of authorised entities including insurances/brokers/sub-
agents and VRT stations. When undergoing a VRT test, the VRT station has the possibility to input the details of the test online, thus immediately informing Transport Malta of the result, while issuing the receipt to the client there and then. In the case of the insurances/brokers/sub-agents, every time someone goes to extend their vehicle insurance policy, the insurance/broker/sub-agent has the possibility to renew also the vehicle road licence and issue the licence disc at one go. The system shows information to both the insurances/brokers/subagents and VRT stations about that particular vehicle and they would know about any details which might be pending, such as informing insurances/brokers/subagents that a VRT test has still not been done or has been failed and hence renewal of the vehicle road licence cannot be committed. VERA is a client server system used by Transport Malta only. This system is used for vehicle registration and administration purposes only. I’m sure that at one time or another someone went to register a vehicle, make a change in the number plates, reprint a number plate, change to personalised plates, change the engine details or do a transfer; Transport Malta employees would be using the VERA system to assist these customers. The other system is VRTS - a client server system used only by the Technical Office at Transport Malta. As in the case of VERA, the citizen does not have direct interaction with the system, however it is very important for VRT stations given that through this application Transport Malta maintains details of the VRT stations, VRT testers, stationery sold to the stations, etc. Transport Malta is planning other online services, ensuring a one stop shop to the public. This is also in line with the National Digital Strategy which covers till 2020 where one of the main pillars is the digital citizen and therefore I would like to remain in the transport team to be part of these challenging initiatives.