Ruairí Quinn
Question:30 Mr. Quinn asked the Taoiseach the progress which has been made in regard to the imple mentation of the Government Action Programme on the Information Society; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [12757/00]
Written Answers - Information Society.
John Bruton
Question:31 Mr. J. Bruton asked the Taoiseach if he will make a statement on the implementation of the Government Action Programme on the Information Society. [13381/00]
I propose to take Questions Nos. 30 and 31 together.
The Government's action plan for the development of the information society in Ireland was launched in January 1999. The plan covers a number of areas such as infrastructure, legislation, electronic public services, access, etc., and mandates Departments and agencies to undertake specific tasks to ensure quick adoption of the plan.
Since the publication of the plan, major initiatives under way include the provision of broadband connectivity to Europe and the US is well advanced with bandwidth being sold on to the private sector. Work is also under way on providing broadband infrastructure to the regions and significant funding has been allocated to this in the national development plan; the e-commerce Bill which will give a legal framework to e-commerce transactions is currently before the Oireachtas and should be enacted later this month or next month; Enterprise Ireland is currently running e-business initiatives to raise awareness of e-commerce among SME's and the joint Information Society Commission-IBEC awareness initiative for the business community has recently concluded. Initiatives to increase awareness among the general public include a TV series on technology aimed at those wary of technology, which recently started on RTE; the Information Society Commission has recently published a report on IT Access for All, which contains recommendations to enable universal participation in the information age. Arising from this an interdepartmental group is being established to draw up an access strategy; pilot projects on the electronic delivery of public services have commenced with the FÁS online job resource for jobseekers and employers and the Land Registry online service. Work is in progress on the Revenue online service for processing tax returns; this week the Government approved a framework for the delivery of integrated electronic public services and decided that each Department should prepare a strategy for the development of such services; the recent appointment of a director and deputy director of REACH will facilitate its task of designing e-public service delivery systems around life and business events; the Government recently authorised commencement of an e-Cabinet project to bring the benefits of new technologies to the Cabinet process; and a dedicated information society fund has been established with funding of £30 million this year. To date more than £16 million has been committed to 38 projects through the fast track evaluation process to facilitate quick start-ups.
A second progress report on the action plan was published in July 1999 and a third report last April. The action plan and progress reports are available on the e-Ireland page of my Department's website.