All Councils will have Online Presence by late September

The E-Government Bulletin reports that the last local authority in Britain will have its own website by October. All of the UK's 467 local authorities will then have a website, with the rural district of Bridgnorth coming in last as it focuses on customer requirements rather than mere presence.

Early this year, the annual Society of IT Management's review of council sites drew attention to the fact that there were four councils which had yet to develop a site – Bridgnorth, Corby, Vale of White Horse and Lichfield.

Bridgnorth, the independently-controlled district in Shropshire, is now 'the final internet adopter', according to the Bulletin, which reports the council as saying it hopes to launch an initial presence in mid-September following a tender process which will conclude in August. Technology was not a strong policy priority for the council until it was steered in that direction by last year's Government policy requirement. The newly appointed web manager is reported as saying that 'the council could have created a poor quality, static web site at an earlier stage "and been equal to much else of what is on the web" but decided instead to wait until it could create a stronger, citizen-focused site linked to a fully devolved content management system'.

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