HCM CITY — HCM City wants to expand the use of online public services to simplify administrative procedures and reduce their cost for the public, vice chairman of the municipal People’s Committee, Trần Vĩnh Tuyến said.

Speaking at a meeting with districts’ leaders on Wednesday, he admitted that online public services are not synchronised and have many shortcomings.

Level 3 alone includes around 300 online public services applicable in all 24 districts and related to individuals and companies, according to the Department of Information and Communications.

But their use remains at a very low level. Only 1 per cent of work is done online in the cases of the labour, land, construction and food safety and hygiene sectors, and 2 per cent in the economic and civilian sectors.

The departments of Environment and Natural Resources, Home Affairs and Finance do not offer online services.

Of those that do, the Department of Training and Education has the highest percentage of online services -- 73 per cent -- while the departments of Labour, War Invalids and Social Affairs and Planning and Architecture has the lowest -- zero per cent.

Officials of districts and departments blamed the low rate on several reasons like lack of funding and the public’s lack of familiarity with online public services.

Nguyễn Tấn Bỉnh, director of the Department of Health, said the cost of seven software applications used by his department for online public services was around VNĐ20 billion (US$900,000).

Tuyến said authorities should lease software and use the money collected for providing public services to pay for them.

He urged district authorities to set up teams of volunteers by the end of this year to help users become familiar with using online public services.

The districts should co-ordinate with city’s departments to organise training courses for individuals and enterprises in using online public services, he said.

Besides, the Department of Home Affairs should petition the People’s Committee to consider reducing or even scrapping fees for online services, he said.

“The city will stop manual services in future. This will be done first in some areas to persuade people to switch to online services to ensure transparency.”

The city would set up inspection teams to monitor implementation of administrative work at all offices and fine violations, he said.

Tuyến called on the Department of Information and Communications to provide digital signatures to all departments to stop the use of paper documents.

In the next four months the city Department of Planning and Architecture and districts should publish online all detailed 1:2,000 plans, including population targets, to enable the public to access them, he said. — VNS