E-cities report confirms our digital policy is all over the place

NET RESULTS: Dublin has now slumped to second-last position in a list of potential "e-cities" when benchmarked against 13 cities of similar ambition, the Dublin Chamber of Commerce's e-city working group revealed this week.

The update on the report, first produced last year, ranks the cities on a number of criteria, such as availability of capital, regulatory environment, digital infrastructure and taxation. No-one should make the mistake of doubting the independence, thoroughness and importance of the report, which can be downloaded from www.dubchamber.ie.

Nor should anyone underestimate the quality and capability of the group of industry professionals that spent the year visiting cities, compiling statistics and research, and producing the report. These are senior figures in organisations such as McKinsey, Ely Capital, NTL, Eircom, Esat/BT, KPMG, RTÉ, Cisco, Microsoft and AIB, chaired by Iona co-founder and chairman Dr Chris Horn.

The only city to rank lower than Dublin was Prague. We come in just behind Dubai and Tel Aviv. And we trail all the other European cities evaluated: Copenhagen, London, Helsinki, even Milan - all cities in countries whose rate of economic growth we have trumped for years.

To say the results this year are worrying is tepid. They aren't even, in that favourite cliché of column-writers, "a wake-up call". Quite simply, they are downright scandalous. For this State and this city, full of possibility in this area only a few years ago, this report is a tale of good opportunities squandered. We did once have a very good shot at being a model state in this regard, but dithering has led to a state of digital entropy that grows more difficult to redress with each passing month.

The report notes areas of achievement, too, but suggests rightly that they are too minimal or too half-hearted or too weakly thought-out to have the needed impact.

We've appointed an e-minister in Ms Mary Hanafin, one of the top recommendations of last year's report. But the report wryly states that "an interesting innovation we did not anticipate" was that she should also be appointed chief whip. That might actually work well, concedes the report, before politely noting that it is, in effect, utterly ridiculous for the Taoiseach to then also land her with the role of junior minister for defence and expect her to get anything done.

The previous report also said the Government lacked a clear vision and action plan on e-infrastructure. This past year, the updated report states, the Government did laudably produce its New Connections digital vision policy document. It reproduces chunks of it, as well as bits of speeches by the Taoiseach, all in support of a wonderful world of broadband connections and happy-clappy e-government.

But it concludes that maybe the goals are a bit ambitious, especially when so little has actually been achieved. What seems to happen, over and over, is a flutter of activity around a few subsections of the bigger problems. A speech is produced, a Bill signed or document written, a project launched. Then silence. Industry and consumers have no idea whether things have progressed and no-one offers any answers.

Meanwhile, small and bitter skirmishes are fought as the very few civil servants working on digital policy battle to retain programmes or argue for others. The next we hear, funds have been cut or projects scaled back.

"There's a lot of good words and then a tactical half-heartedness," Dr Horn says with a sigh. "I think we need to be brave. At the moment, the broadband debate is way down the Government agenda." Without urgent and comprehensive change, he says, "we will indeed become a second-class nation".

In short, the Government produces piecemeal policy (and occasionally, a larger vision such as New Connections) that no-one of any significant profile drives with the needed vigour and courage. No one - especially those at the very top - seems to believe in these policies. Ms Hanafin has shown commitment but lacks real power to implement.

Does anyone in Government understand how totally disillusioning and exasperating this is for Irish businesses, for the multinationals whose executives arrive in Dublin to be welcomed by syrupy 28 kilobit internet connections in our best hotels, for the ordinary consumers who watch the rest of Europe get internet services we only dream of here?

The report is clear on what needs to be done: "Our key recommendation at this time is the urgent need to develop a comprehensive, holistic and coherent national plan for a high quality e-infrastructure, including nurturing its widespread adoption by our society. Pragmatism is needed, and there needs to be a balance between short-term, medium-term and long-term actions and goals; and between the needs of rural areas and the needs of the urban majority. . . Stability of Government policy is now critical if operators are going to invest further in the Irish broadband infrastructure."

One problem at the moment is the "stakeholders" in this infrastructure - citizen groups, telecom operators, businesses - aren't being consulted in a formal and consistent manner. Perhaps in frustration with the adversarial relationship it has had with some segments of industry, such as the telecom operators, the Government now seems to work out policy behind closed doors, with advisers coming primarily from the US.

But this is alienating exactly the people who need to be involved. Worse, we outside the ministerial meeting rooms have no idea what is going on. We're talking a national loss of faith in areas where the Government was truly seen to be advancing matters in the past. Britain realised ages ago that, to move policy forward in this area, stakeholders need to be part of the discussion or they won't buy in to it. The e-cities report is correct in stating we need a similar approach here.

There's much more within the report. Anyone interested in the State's digital future will want to have a look.