Local Public Data Panel: third meeting 1st June 2010
Meeting note - actions
Panel attendees:
Professor Nigel Shadbolt (Chair), Tim Allen (Local Government Association), Janet Hughes (London Assembly), Jos Creese (Hampshire County Council), Nick Aldridge (Mission Fish), Roger Hampson (Redbridge Borough Council), William Perrin (Talk About Local), Chris Taggart (Openlylocal.com) Dave Smith (Sunderland City Council) – Ex Officio: Andrew Stott (Cabinet Office), Grant Fitzner (CLG).
Other Attendees:
Vicky Sargent (Boilerhouse/SOCITM), David Fry, Renee Woodhouse, Hulya Mustafa, Padma Juggapah, Steve Peters, Dave King, David Plant (minutes) – all CLG.
1 March meeting note
The meeting note was considered and progress discussed. Progress reports on several of the actions to follow later in the agenda.
Review of the Local Data Panel
Transparency was high on the Coalition’s agenda. Details of initial commitments were in the “Letter from the Prime Minister to Government Departments on plans to open up Government Data” - http://tiny.cc/5mnf2 In particular a Public Sector Transparency Board was to be set up to support and challenge Departments, set standards and develop the right to data.
Therefore while the context had changed, with the agenda now more radical, the objectives and drivers were the same. New Ministers were keen for urgent progress, but there needed to be a balance between compulsion and encouragement. Chief Executives and the LGA should have a role in determining what is achievable.
There would need to be guidelines for local authorities, consistent with those for central government, but in language that works for local government. It was important to work with leading authorities to develop this. While in the first instance it was important to get data out there to build momentum, in the medium term we also needed to look at standards. The best standards are those arising from real world use, refined as needed.
There was a discussion of the future role of the Panel given the creation of the Transparency Board. While a range of views were expressed, it was agreed that the Panel still had a valid role in unlocking barriers, promoting best practice and ensuring local government was keeping on track. But it was felt that the Panel needed to be more active, achieving quick simple solutions to issues. A possible role for the Panel might be as a sub-group of the Transparency Board, but any new mandate would need to be considered and affirmed by Ministers and the Cabinet Office.
Publication by Local Authorities of expenditure over £500
The paper on the publication of itemised local authority expenditure was presented and discussed. It was agreed that the best way forward was to publish a revised draft of the advice on data.gov.uk inviting comment and corrections from the sector, with a view to developing helpful guidance for local authorities. (See http://tinyurl.com/2vmdoy7 ) This would need to incorporate consideration of FoI, children, vulnerable groups etc
The Panel thanked William and Chris for their work on this area.
Action:
Comments to William Perrin to incorporate into draft. William to liaise with Cabinet Office regarding publication on Data.Gov.UK
Progress on Workstreams
Local Public Data exemplars – So far 6 authorities had provided data links to data.gov.uk – Lichfield, Warwickshire, Bournemouth, Brent, Hampshire and Sunderland, with several others expected to do so within the next couple of weeks. In total about 100 data links had been submitted and around 20 authorities had been invited to become exemplars.
It was felt however that the process needed to be made easier, preferably with LAs able to enter their own data links directly to data.gov.uk. Also there was a need to consider how to go beyond the initial easy datasets, to start to push for others. Expectation was that the datasets already provided would help define the overall list of what could be expected.
Action:
Secretariat to liaise with Cabinet Office on how the entry process could be made more user friendly.
Recipe Book – Would be based on the National Archives “Guide to responsible publishing”, which considers what standards exist and to what purpose as well as categories and types of data. This would be supplemented by feedback from the recent LeGSB event on standards. The view was expressed that we should get something published quickly for comment. Potentially however there could be a need for an increasingly detailed set of documents, starting with a short high level document.
Action:
Secretariat to release an early draft of the guide for comment within the next two weeks.
Open Election Project – Chris Taggart began by outlining the objectives of the project – to start exposing Local Election results as open data; to help councils to understand the issues behind publishing data and to identify where the problems were going to be. About 20 councils have taken part, with over 100 people signed up for the Community of Practice. As problems developed, the community developed tools to help. One of the issues to overcome would be where LAs had outsourced their IT, although in this instance some suppliers had made changes for free.
The Panel noted the progress made and thanked Chris for his hard work on this project.
Actions:
- William to help set up meeting for Chris with BBC election team
- Chris and Jos Creese to capture the overall learning and publish via SOCITM
Presentation on LPDP Communications
Vicky Sargent took us through her presentation on communications.
The new requirement to release data means that it is more important than ever to demonstrate how this is part of a wider agenda, and ensure we demonstrate the benefits as well as encourage innovative uses and a self service approach. Need to promote the agenda through all available channels – eg data.gov.uk; SOCITM; IDeA Communities of Practice; info4local, rather than set up a separate website. Info4local in particular could offer a suitable platform going forward. Consider presence at relevant third party events and possibly a virtual IDeA CoP event.
Actions: for Secretariat
- Consider setting up a CoP for taking forward the project for the publication of expenditure over £500.
- Make more use of Info4local
- Need to work closely with Cabinet Office on forward strategy.
- Comms strategy should be tied to specific projects eg expenditure over £500.
Looking Ahead
Given the need to review the future of the Panel within the changed Government priorities no future meeting date was set at this time.
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