British slow to use e-government services.

• Author: Swartz, Nikki
• Position: Up front: news, trends & analysis - Brief Article

Britain is one of a few nations that has set explicit targets for making all government services available electronically but, much to its chagrin, British citizens are not using them. And worse, usage of e-government services has not grown in the past two years, Steve Marsh of the Office of the e-Envoy told The Economist.

According to a study by the Booz Allen Hamilton research firm, only about 15 percent of British citizens used e-government services in 2001 while Americans (approximately 37 percent), Canadians (45 percent), French (19 percent), Germans (19 percent), Italians (30 percent), and Japanese (18 percent) did so at higher average rates.

In addition, a U.K. official involved in the initiative told The Economist that nothing less than a miracle will be required for the British government to meet its deadline for getting all its services online. So far, about 70 percent of government services can be accessed via the Internet, and that figure is expected to reach only 80 percent by the end of 2005, the date by which everything...