Today, Professor David Rhind spoke on the re-use of public sector information for the benefit of services to the public at the Intellect Identity & Information conference. The conference was well attended by approximately 100 delegates from the private organisations such as Cable&Wireless, Consult Hyperion, Siemans IT Solutions and Getronics, as well as government departments and agencies. The opening keynote presentation was given by Christopher Graham, Information Commissioner who talked about the challenge of the Information Commissioner's Office in delivering a balance between information security and information rights.
Christopher Graham was followed by Professor David Rhind’s talk about the importance of re-using information to stimulate innovation and drive the knowledge economy. He said that the benefits of PSI re-use
• Underpins democratic accountability (e.g. Government meeting PSA targets, local authority and CLA outcomes, NHS Trusts meeting 4 hour/18 week, MRSA targets, etc)
• Raises awareness of citizens’ rights and responsibilities
• Facilitates community activity
• Can be used to enhance efficiency e.g. tune services, allocate resources to meet real needs
• Can underpin innovation and hence create jobs and provide choice in services
Professor also asserted that an interest in making PSI more readily available has grown hugely in recent months, particularly as a result of the Making Public Data Public initiative led by Sir Tim Berners-Lee and Professor Nigel Shadbolt. Despite the optimism and drive in this area, he said there are still factors that block the effective exploitation of PSI. Drawing on APPSI’s recent advice to the Shareholder Executive, Tim Berners-Lee and the Cabinet Office, he set out the recommendations for information ‘prospecting and harvesting’ in the short term and the long-term strategy to create/refine a national information infrastructure, as well as the policy changes and actions needed to facilitate successful re-use of PSI. See David-Rhind-presentation.pdf (1.05 MB) and the Conference-Agenda.pdf (82.42 KB)
Posted at Wednesday, October 28, 2009 2:39:42 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)
