The overarching approach to implementing a ‘tell-us-once’ approach to public service delivery can be found across the Better Public Services - Public Service Transformation 2030 Strategy, the Digital Public Services Plan 2030 and the Action Plan for Designing Better Public Services - A roadmap for embedding design in the Public Service.
A core principle across each of these plans is the design of better public services centred around the different life events during which a person may need to interact with a public service body, in a way that promotes co-creation of seamless services by relevant departments involved in providing services for that life event, in a way that obviates the need for service users to continually provide the same information to different providers.
A key component of this is the development of a Digital Wallet pursuant to the EU eIDAS Regulations that will provide any person seeking to use a public service with a way to securely share their own personal data to access public services. This provides the means for storing relevant personal data digitally on a ‘once off’, basis which the person who voluntarily downloads the Wallet can use multiple times on different occasions as required when engaging with public sector bodies for their particular service. It reduces the requirement for multiple form filing and verification, as the person’s, personal details are coming from a trusted source with the fully informed consent of the individual involved. Work is ongoing to implement this regulation, led by the Department of Culture. Communications and Sport.
Finally, we are ready to establish an integrated data ecosystem where high-quality FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and Reusable) data is routinely used to inform policy, service design, and delivery. Over the five-year period of the Data Strategy, measures will be introduced to address issues around the quality of data, how data is found, curated and accessed as well as the platforms and processes used to share data.
