We are the Digital Council for Aotearoa New Zealand. We are looking forward to sharing our mahi (work) here with you. In keeping with the #weeknotes approach, we want to be transparent about our work. Plus, we are looking for input from people from all walks of life to inform our advice to the New Zealand Government on harnessing the potential of digital and data to make Aotearoa New Zealand a great place for all.
This month we finalised our three-year roadmap and 12-month work programme with Ministers Hon. Kris Faafoi, in his role as Minister of Government Digital Services, and the Hon. James Shaw, in his role as Minister of Statistics, agreeing the themes of our advice to the government.
We agreed the dates and deliverables for the year and the structure of how we will manage our work streams and engage with stakeholders.
Broad themes for the Digital Council
Over the next three years we will focus on the medium to long term issues facing New Zealand, spreading our research and advice across the following three broad themes:
- Trust
- Inclusion
- Innovation
Trust as a theme
This year, the Digital Council will focus on trust in digital technologies and data.
We will deliver an interim report outlining our early and emerging findings in July 2020, with a more comprehensive, final report in December 2020.
Understanding trust as a theme
We have started our work by undertaking foundational activities, including prioritising the agreement of key concepts and definitions of key terms such as trust, trustworthiness and social licence.
We are undertaking a targeted literature review and talking to relevant stakeholders to consolidate the work and studies already undertaken.
Next, we’ll do our own research and develop an engagement plan to guide our conversations with New Zealanders later in the year.
Talking to New Zealand about trust
Following publication of our interim report, we will discuss and test our early findings and assumptions with New Zealanders, through a mix of traditional consultation and face-to-face meetings to better understand lived experience and the real-world impact.
Our goal is to engage in a way that enables all New Zealanders to have their say, including those whose voices are the least often heard.
Publishing our advice
Following consultation and engagement, we will collate and analyse the information gathered over the year.
It will be published as a report and include recommendations for everyone, including the government.
What you can expect from our report
Our goal is to deliver a final report that covers the following topics.
- An understanding, supported by robust evidence, of the levels of trust and social licence in New Zealand in relation to digital and data-driven technologies.
- A picture of the areas where trust is strong and needs to be maintained and the areas where there are gaps in trust that need addressing.
- Clarity on how increased trust in digital technologies benefits the public and private sectors, as well as individuals, small-to-medium enterprises and primary industries.
- Recommendations on the practical steps needed to bring government, industry, communities and citizens closer together to address the issues identified.
Additional advice
In addition, we intend to deliver advice on other topical issues identified either by government or by Council members. For example, we are currently researching some of the medium to longer term digital and data issues relevant to New Zealand’s COVID-19 recovery.
About our work: Council members come together monthly to make key decisions and progress our work programme. Between formal meetings, members focus on various work streams. Colin Gavaghan and Marianne Elliott lead our research work, Kendall Flutey and Roger Dennis our ad-hoc work, and Rachel Kelly and Nikora Ngaropo lead our comms, while our chair, Mitchell Pham, holds responsibility for stakeholder engagement.
