This executive summary lays out highlights from the report "Canada’s Digital Renaissance: OneGov and Beyond," written by Max Bell School Master of Public Policy students Arwa Emhemed, Gagan Gill, Leona Bu, Raihana Kamal, and Sean Celi as part of the 2024 Policy Lab.
Access the summary and presentation below, and read their full report here.
Currently, only about 22.5% of Government of Canada’s 1,637 services are fully available online. A number of public services still heavily rely on paper-based documentation and in-person visits to government offices. Even seemingly online services often require printed document submissions, posing administrative burdens and, in some cases, heightened security and privacy risks compared to digitally verified methods. Given these concerns, Interac has tasked our team with providing policy recommendations on the key factors limiting the adoption of digital service delivery for citizens at the federal level.
The Canadian government tends to digitalize its services rapidly during crises driven by a sense of urgency that minimizes bureaucratic delays. However, this momentum often diminishes after the crisis passes. With rising global crises in climate and geopolitical conflicts, immigration levels are predicted to increase in Canada. The government's digital unpreparedness may hinder its ability to meet the increased demands in immigration services. With these considerations, we have decided to narrow our focus to the Department of Immigration, Refugee, and Citizenship Canada (IRCC). This focus provided us with a compelling case study to build the recommendations in this report. We draw on data from interviews with stakeholders from various institutions and existing literature to better understand potential barriers and solutions to government digitalization at large and within IRCC. To this end, we conducted a total of 28 interviews to ensure a well-rounded understanding of the policy challenge. These included a wide range of individuals from government and academic institutions.
First, we identify six key barriers to digital transformation:
- Canadian Exceptionalism: Canada's unique geopolitical landscape and government structure present challenges to implementing some of the digital transformation practices adopted in other countries.
- Siloed Structure of the Public Service: Comprehensive integration of digital technologies across all departments is difficult due to their tendency to prioritize individual mandates resulting in fragmented and inconsistent digital services.
- Culture of Risk Aversion: The structure of public service results in leaders being afraid to take risks which hampers digital transformation.
- Lack of Common Language: Canada lacks a common working language between policy and IT teams leading to miscommunication and project failures.
- Legacy Systems: Transition away from outdated systems has been hindered by slow progress, high costs, and focus on replicating paper-based processes online.
- Complicated Procurement: Overly complicated procurement processes often results in overrun costs and delays.
Second, in response to these challenges, we propose implementing a Government-of-Canada-wide initiative called OneGov, aimed at scaling the digital transformation of public services. OneGov represents a philosophical shift in the Canadian public service, emphasizing a continuous drive towards digital transformation. Based on OneGov, this report puts forward three programmatic recommendations:
- One Platform: Based on the Government-as-a-Platform (GaaP) approach, this recommendation aims to change the government's role from being the sole provider of isolated services to being an enabler of public services. According to the OECD Digital Government Framework, a GaaP model should (1) create a digital-first ecosystem that support service teams, (2) create a public service marketplace, and (3) rethink the citizen-state relationship. Following these OECD's guidelines, we propose the establishment of one platform that enables a seamless data-sharing infrastructure, a centralized service portal, and a single digital login for all federal services.
- Digital Government Units (DGUs) 2.0: Based on Amanda Clarke’s concept of Digital Government Units, we propose implementing non-linear, three-stage process within each department that are scalable across other departments and less prone to major risk. These stages include (1) creating multidisciplinary teams, (2) encouraging experimentation, and (3) concurrent reviews. This focused approach offers a cost-effective and simple solution to service development.
- Government as A Smart Buyer: Based on contemporary theories of government procurement we propose reframing the procurement mechanisms of the Canadian Government. This involves adopting a smart buyer approach to effectively acquire innovative digital tools and ensure user-centric service delivery. This entails three requirements: (1) strengthening digital procurement capacity within individual departments, (2) awarding smaller contracts to break down the long-planned procurement contract model, (3) unifying the procurement of digital tools across departments by enabling collaborative use of procurement contracts.
We recognize that we have taken on an incredibly complex policy challenge and that numerous individuals have been working on this topic thoughtfully over the last few decades. OneGov represents our best attempt to contribute to the literature and present possible solutions to this challenge.
Download the full version of this report here.
Authors: Gagan Gill, Arwa Emhemed, Sean Celi, Leona Bu, and Raihana Kamal
