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The Government 2.0 Steering Group

By John Sheridan - AGIMO on 15 Sep 2010 2:24pm
Gov 2.0

The report of the Government 2.0 Taskforce said that leadership was one of the pillars of Government 2.0. Leadership, the Taskforce said, is crucial in bringing about the cultural change required to make government more open and transparent.

The Australian Government accepted the Taskforce’s recommendation to create a Government 2.0 Steering Group to provide leadership and oversight in implementing the Government 2.0 agenda. The role of the Steering Group also includes advocating that agenda across the Australian Public Service and reporting to the Government on its progress. The Steering Group’s terms of reference are available below:

The Department of Finance and Deregulation will work in consultation with the Steering Group as it leads the implementation of the Government’s response to the Government 2.0 Taskforce.

The Steering Group members are senior public servants representing a range of agencies, including:

  • The Department of Finance and Deregulation (Government 2.0 lead agency): Ms Ann Steward (chair) and Mr John Sheridan
  • The Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet: Dr Wendy Southern
  • The Office of the Australian Information Commissioner: Professor John McMillan
  • The Australian Public Service Commission: Ms Annwyn Godwin
  • The National Archives of Australia: Ms Margaret Chalker
  • The Australian Bureau of Statistics: Dr Siu-Ming Tam
  • The Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy: Mr Richard Windeyer
  • The Department of Human Services: Mr John Wadeson
  • The Australian Taxation Office: Ms Alison Lendon
  • The Attorney-General’s Department: Mr Kym Duggan

The Steering Group has met three times. These meetings have been productive, with a lot of groundwork covered and progress made on developing the work plan that will inform the implementation of the Government 2.0 agenda.

The Steering Group’s terms of reference specify that it will publish documents from its meetings online as a demonstration of transparency. While this was not possible during the election caretaker period, included below are summaries of the first three meetings:

As shown in the meeting summaries, one of the Steering Group’s key tasks so far has been to coordinate a Government 2.0 Work Plan capturing the various tasks a range of agencies will undertake in implementing the Government 2.0 agenda. The Work Plan is included below:

The Steering Group plans to share as much information as possible through this blog and other means as appropriate. I’d welcome your feedback and suggestions about the work of the Steering Group.

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14 Comments
  1. Neil says:
    September 15, 2010 at 3:10 pm

    This is great.

    In terms of feedback,

    Meeting 3: 4 September 2010, Dotpoint 4

    Status reports were provided about the Government 2.0 Work Plan. In addition to the Work Plan tasks, members agreed to investigate which government data sets could be released by their agencies.

    Are you only considering data sets from agencies of members on the Steering Group?

    As previous mashups have shown, it is sometimes from the least obvious datasets that interesting and useful tools have been created. There must be some powerful data at the Australian War Memorial, the National Museum of Australia and the Department of Resources, Energy and Tourism (just to name three).

    Good luck with it.

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  2. John Sheridan says:
    September 15, 2010 at 3:19 pm

    Thanks Neil,

    THe answer is no – data sets from all agencies are sought. The meeting discussion was around the role of the members as “champions” of Gov 2.0 and what they could do within their agencies.

    Regards

    John

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  3. Neil says:
    September 15, 2010 at 4:26 pm

    Thanks John,

    Additionally, is there a plan to create a whole of government inventory of social media sites? The US DOD have one at: http://www.defense.gov/registeredsites/socialmediasites.aspx

    This could be tailored for each of our departments.

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  4. Neil says:
    September 22, 2010 at 11:22 am

    Hi John,

    In the August Gov 2 Work Plan, 4.5 reads, “The Gov 2.0 govdex community has been created, however, a general announcement of its availability won’t be made until after the caretaker period.”

    Is this forum the Gov 2.0 community or do I need to register separately for that?
    Neil

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  5. John Sheridan - AGIMO says:
    September 22, 2010 at 6:50 pm

    Hi Neil

    There is a community on our APS-specific govdex collaboration platform (http://www.govdex.gov.au/). The govdex site explains how to contact the administrators for access.

    Regards

    John

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  6. Steve Davies says:
    October 5, 2010 at 7:28 pm

    You might be interested in this breakfast presentation >>> http://bit.ly/bkjF70

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    • Neil says:
      October 15, 2010 at 3:26 pm

      Thanks Steve,

      I made it to that presentation and it was good. Thanks for the link.

      It becomes more apparent to me that to get things progressed, you have to do it in your own time; while balancing the line between the APS Values/ Code of Conduct etc and for the greater good.

      Hopefully, following Greg Jericho posting again, public servants will feel more comfortable posting online and contributing to a better run public service.

      Also, I note that you have posted up the minutes for the first three steering committee meetings on this page (http://agimo.govspace.gov.au/2010/09/15/the-government-2-0-steering-group/). They are also available from the govdex site following registration (https://www.govdex.gov.au/confluence/display/GOV2/Meetings). Does this mean future documents will only be available from govdex?

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      • John Sheridan says:
        October 15, 2010 at 11:09 pm

        Hi Neil

        The answer to your question is no. The Gov 2.0 Steering Group is committed to walking the walk not just talking the talk and will continue to publish its proceedings on the AGIMO blog.

        Cheers

        John

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        • John Lalor says:
          October 27, 2010 at 7:44 am

          I wondered if the steering committee has meet since their third meeting and if so when will the minutes be available. Also I found the Government 2.0 Work Plan Stauts Report August 2010 very informative. Is there a later update available?

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          • John Sheridan - AGIMO says:
            October 27, 2010 at 8:11 am

            Hi John

            The fourth meeting was delayed. It is occurring soon. Updated documents will be posted after it occurs.

            Cheers

            John

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  7. AGIMO Blog Team says:
    December 6, 2010 at 1:59 pm

    Comments on this post are now closed. Please let us know if you would like to discuss this post.

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