Malcolm Gorton Senior Scientist Environment Agency Science - Technology Group England and Wales the Environment Agency

Non departmental public body responsible to UK government department of the environment - (defra) Wide range of duties and powers relating to environmental management 11,000 staff across England and Wales 8 regional offices, 26 area offices Approximately100 staff respond to >350,000 requests We place a high priority on the provision of information in achieving environmental goals the Environment Agency

What does this mean? An immense amount of paper!!! A lot of which the public has the right of access to Estimated to be about 10 million documents of public register relevance! Maps data and documents across 8 regional offices, 26 area offices 26 different methods of collating and maintaining them

Application Advert Consultation Responses Licence Monitoring Action Public Register Public Registers: …the process

Are people generally aware? Are paper files convenient? Is the information presented meaningfully? Is location in offices convenient? Do we reach a wide cross- section of society? Could we do better?! Public access: does it work?

Purpose To provide public register information in a modern electronic manner that befits the environment, our customers and our business Driver Government modernising targets Defra Legislative Review group Requirement to operate openly Reduction of travel to our Area offices Public Registers online - first steps

Public Registers online - next steps Internal EA project - electronic document management Scanning and storing historic public register documents All new documents will be stored and accessed electronically Relatively a small step to open those documents to the public However ….. yet another information repository on the web will not meet the spirit of Freedom of Information legislation will not address the issues of social inclusion/participation is unlikely to address the issues in the earlier section

Sources of information Newspapers, TV and Radio and were the most impertinent sources of information. Interestingly the limited use of information (Government reports) could include distrust of such organisations or simply due to difficulties in accessing them. Information should be presented in a simple and jargon free manner As we move toward an era in which increasing information is available sometimes exclusively through web based systems there is a need to consider and accommodate many other user groups: limited ICT knowledge wide socio economic groups wide cultural backgrounds Important to gain a better understanding of local informal networks and to improve information provision to support information intermediaries.

Electronic access to actual documents Real time ‘flagging’ of live decisions Research into social aspects of engagement Partnerships with local community groups Electronic ‘open forums’ Record interests and provide relevant information Assess impacts on our own organisation Our aims

Make information relevant to everyday lives Link Information Systems to Participation Systems Provide access without effort, where and when required Use novel techniques to reach all of society Engaging Citizens

Information Participation Forums Data WIYBY II, Property Search and other information services Proactive dissemination SMS Local Authorities Community Groups and resources Local Networks Central dBase

A nice idea but ……………... Challenges lie ahead Documents are far from jargon free Documents are not always geo-referenced People still need to learn such information exists and still may be wary of “government provision Research has shown users are wary of online participation Organisational ways of working may have to change producers of information and data will have to think of the end user from the start impacts on the organisation may be significant users expectation is only likely to grow