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To access links, see Steven Clift's blog: http://dowire.org/notes/?p=249 Post: UK - Digital Inclusion, Digital Challenge Finalists - Congrats Bristol I've been watching the new UK Department of Communities and Local Government closely (has most of the former-ODPM duties with the active citizenship work from Home Office moved over). Today they announced the 10 finalists for their Digital Challenge Award. The winners all look quite interesting. (See the three clips below.) I put in my supportive two cents for the winning Bristol proposal which includes some good e-neighbourhood items (also see their blog and Stephen Hilton's blog). Bristol Council was E-Democracy.Org's lead in year two of the Local E-democracy National Project's support of local Issues Forums in the UK (note the joint e-conference including Bristol's "e-panel" model.) I am hoping to connect Bristol with E-Democracy.Org's online neighborhood forum efforts starting in Minneapolis and see if we can share our use of the GroupServer open source technology. What I've e-mailed privately in the past with my UK contacts is my concern about the need to publicly link the growing local democracy push with ICTs at the top level of rhetoric. Below are speech clips from top MPs in the DCLG today. The framework is apparent, I just want to see that sentence that demonstrates an opportunity for ICTs from the democracy agenda rather than finding it elsewhere as an off-shoot of e-government service efforts. The Digital Inclusion agenda is getting us closer. If you have thoughts on this, post them to the blog or e-mail me: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Steven Clift http://publicus.net P.S. Soon to be announced - the UK E-Democracy Exchange (the old do-uk YahooGroup is being reborn on DoWire Groups): http://groups.dowire.org/groups/uk 1. Text from Ruth Kelly, UK Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, sent on 12 July 2006 the Prime Minister: http://www.communities.gov.uk/index.asp?id=1501559 "7. In your letter to me you said you wanted to see a radical, devolutionary White Paper on local government. I believe we are at a tipping point in our democracy where we can usher in a new and unprecedented era of devolution. At all levels of governance I want to move from "earned autonomy" to "presumed autonomy" - empowering others not taking power at the centre. 8. I see this reform of local government as enabling us to take further decisive steps on the road to the personalisation of services, creating stronger local leadership to make our cities world class and to tackle issues like climate change and crime and anti-social behaviour, and to secure greater efficiency and value for money from local authorities. 9. To achieve this we need to devolve to and from the town hall. I want to see councils with the powers and levers they need to ensure all local services work together to deliver personalised services tailored to meet the needs of communities, individuals and families; to reflect local priorities; and tackle difficult issues and make better places where people are proud to live. That means enabling people to get things done in their neighbourhoods quickly and easily, with more say for local people, more responsive local services and more opportunities for communities to assume greater responsibility for, or even ownership of, community assets." Text from a speech by Angela Smith MP, Minister for e-government, at the Digital Challenge awards ceremony on 12 July 2006: http://www.communities.gov.uk/index.asp?id=1501551 "1. I am really pleased to be here today to announce the winners of this round of the Digital Challenge. Before I announce the names of the finalists I want to say a few words about why, as Minister responsible for e-government, I believe this work is so important. And second, I want to set out how we intend to take the work forward in practical ways. ... 4. Digital inclusion is not just about access to new technologies. That is the means to the end, but usually not the end in itself. Digital inclusion is about solving problems and making life better for people in our communities. And especially for those people who are harder to reach or need more help to access vital services, life chances and opportunities. ... 13. We hope this will encourage you all to work in partnership over the coming years. And I am inviting people here today and those watching via the web to join in a series of thematic events offline. These will cover issues such as meeting the needs of older people, new technologies for crime reporting, improving democratic engagement and using new media for community programme. 14. To support this and the wider digital inclusion agenda we are setting up a new Digital Inclusion Team. This will be funded by DCLG and will focus specifically on how new technology can make a difference to the lives of socially excluded people. Much of this follows directly from the former Social Exclusion Unit's ground-breaking work published last year in the 'Inclusion through Innovation' report. " From: http://dcin.21cc.co.uk/top-ten-finalists The Top Ten National Finalists of Digital Challenge, as announced on 12th July, are: * The Virtual District of Stratford-upon-Avon - Stratford on Avon District Council * City and Rural Communities Using IT - Birmingham City Council (Lead Authority) & Shropshire County Council * My Norfolk - Norfolk County Council on behalf of the Norfolk Ambition County Strategic Partnership * Sunderland - Where people matter - Sunderland City Council * Success Through Diversity Enabled by Digital Innovation - Ealing Council * Connecting Bristol - Building Momentum for Change - Bristol City Council on behalf of Connecting Bristol and the Momentum Group * Connected Nottingham - Nottingham City & Nottinghamshire County Council * STREAM - Transforming Neighbourhoods - Kingston Upon Hull City Council * Digital MK - Milton Keynes Council * One-Manchester - Manchester City Council, in partnership with Tameside MBC *** Democracies Online Newswire - http://DoWire.Org *** To comment/for links: http://dowire.org/notes/?p=249 To network: http://groups.dowire.org Submit posts: http://dowire.org/submit Member profile for Steven: http://groups.dowire.org/main/contacts/stevenclift ----------------------------------------- Group home for Newswire - Steven Clift's blog posts by e-mail: http://groups.dowire.org/main/groups/newswire Replies go to members of Newswire - Steven Clift's blog posts by e-mail with all posts on this topic here: http://groups.dowire.org/topic/120616 For digest version or to leave Newswire - Steven Clift's blog posts by e-mail, email [email protected] with "digest on" or "unsubscribe" in the *subject*. 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