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The Rt. Hon. Patricia HewittE - Summit |
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I'm delighted to be here – to have the opportunity to say a few words and then, together with Stephen and Andrew, to take your questions. It's a particular pleasure to be speaking to an international audience. An important and increasingly popular forum for all policy makers – vital in this global economy. Events like these are vital for sharing and learning about best practice and I'm glad so many people were able to come. A number of people here today helped prepare the Booz Allen benchmarking report which I am publishing today. My thanks to you. This report makes an important contribution to a very important debate. We in Government are taking this report very seriously. As Tony said earlier today, ICT is transforming the way we live, work and do business. And it is a key driver of our productivity and competitiveness. It is vital we as a nation – with our proud history - fully exploit the potential of ICT. Vital if we are to spread prosperity to every corner of Britain. The report contains a number of points and lessons for all of us. But there are three positive areas and three challenges for the UK in particular that I want to highlight. Firstly, the report shows we've made great progress in our drive to make the UK the best in the world for e-commerce. Second only to the US for our e-environment. This is an achievement many thought impossible four years ago. And we've made real progress in key areas: a growing ICT sector, a sophisticated venture capital market, among the world's lowest prices for internet access and the highest penetration of DTV in the world. I know Digby earlier said what an outstanding achievement this was – and praise from Digby is praise indeed! Secondly, we're ranked third for participation by citizens. With high DTV diffusion, high numbers of internet shoppers and a number of people working in ICT. Thirdly, we're ranked second for business uptake of e-government services – and have one of the highest states of e-government readiness, in terms of service availability. So there are many positive things. But there's still much more to do. The report also set out three huge challenges to me. Challenges Firstly, on e-Government services, the report shows that, despite our high state of readiness, only 11% of people have used them. So we're giving a greater focus to the most regular transactions – such as personal taxation and benefits – and have enhanced the 2005 electronic service delivery target to include a clear target on take-up, not just availability. We're investing £6 billion in ICT over the next three years to transform Government services. Secondly, on Broadband. Although broadband is amongst the cheapest in the world, and cheaper than the US, there's still not access for all – 66% of households can access broadband. This is high, but we must stimulate broadband across the whole country, particularly in rural areas, if we are to address the digital divide. We'll be spending over £1 bn on connecting up Government services by broadband. Boosting demand in this way will help promote industry investment and availability. The challenge to business The third challenge relates to business use of ICT. Whilst the report ranks us third for E-business performance – with high investment in ICT; high proportion of businesses with website; and high proportion of SMEs online – the report shows us that there are more potential productivity gains which we must exploit. Now the rush to get on-line is dying down, we must look closer at other areas such as cost reduction and efficiency. My message to business today is that going on-line is not enough. ICT needs to be placed at the centre of business planning. We in Government will continue to provide the highest quality support and advice to business to help with this next phase of e-business development. Because the benefits are huge. And are there for the taking. To take just a couple of examples that I've come across. Weavers Wines Weavers Wines – a traditional local business in Nottingham, established in 1844. They introduced their website in 1999 and by 2000 had an entire product database – showing stock figures, product information and customer habits immediately. They now send email alerts to customers around the world. One came from the USA to attend a wine tasting! Online sales have grown by an average of 10% a month – 95% of which is repeat business. Neautralise Or Neautralise – a web marketing company which Stephen was telling me he visited in Cornwall three weeks ago. Neautralise is run by a husband and wife team who were based in London but were only able to relocate to Cornwall because broadband is available there. They've expanded to a team of six. And now serve clients from all over the UK from their rural base – with 25% of their business coming from overseas. Kellogg Brown & Root Or Kellogg Brown and Root. Who are using ICT to do things quicker, cheaper and more effectively. Harnessing different bits of expertise from around the globe. They were recently running a major oil development off Nigeria – using British engineers and Singaporean designers. The British engineers would finish their day and then send their work to Singapore – so it was ready for the designers when they came in to start work the following morning – six hours after the British workers had clocked off. And this is the point - ICT removes geographical boundaries. Time boundaries. And, increasingly, there are no technological boundaries. The main boundary now is ourselves. Our ability to rise to new technologies. So this is the challenge. We can't rest - not for a moment. By standing still, we are sliding back. The challenges are changing. But the approach remains the same. A firm partnership between Government and industry – best exemplified through the wonderful Information Age Partnership, which David Jordan chairs. Stephen, Andrew and I would all now be delighted to take your questions. |
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Other speeches by The Rt. Hon. Patricia Hewitt
(the following are available from the archive) |
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