Author: Derek Walker, Chief Executive Wales Co-operative Centre
The starting gun of the race online was fired years ago but the finishing line is not yet in sight.
As many as 785,000 people in Wales are not online or are not using technology to an adequate level that enables them to engage with the activities and services they want to access.
And while some of us are still not out of the starting blocks, the race online is getting faster. Technological advances are not only making more activities possible on the internet, they are sometimes now only available on line. For instance we have only been able to buy tickets for the London Olympics online. The chances are, if you do not know how to use the internet then you will not be seeing ‘the greatest show on earth’ first hand.
Public bodies are increasingly looking to digital technology to improve services but also to save money. The DWP is proposing that the new Universal Credit will ‘normally’ be made through the internet and expect that most subsequent contact with recipients will also be conducted online. The Big Lottery Fund is planning that the vast majority of funding applications are made online in future. People that are not able to access these functions through the internet will be provided with additional support.
Waiting for people that did not grow up with computers to die off is not the answer. Other groups such as those with low incomes, few qualifications or who are disabled are far more likely to not use the internet, whatever their age. Not having access to digital technology is making their challenges even greater.
In Wales we are taking steps to narrow the digital divide. The Welsh Government’s digital inclusion programme ‘Communities 2.0’, which the Wales Co-operative Centre is delivering as part of a consortium, is helping more communities and small enterprises to make the most of the internet. Communities 2.0 has already supported thousands of people and hundreds of organisations, in some of our most deprived communities, to get more from digital technologies.
There are inspiring projects taking place across Wales. In Caerphilly, the ‘Come Surf with Me’ project is working with residents in a number of Communities First areas and provides specialist provision through the medium of Welsh. In North Wales, the recently launched ‘Take Ctrl’ initiative, supported by Communities 2.0, will see social housing tenants helped to get online while learning more about money management.
The Digital Heritage in the Community project, in West Wales, has seen a 90-year-old woman helped to publish her first book online. Local and personal history has proved a popular way of interesting people in the web
These initiatives are welcome but we should not underestimate the problem or assume that, in time, it will take care of itself. Digital inclusion is one of the most important social justice issue for our times. If we fail to act, we fail some of the most disadvantaged people in our society.
First published on Bevan Foundation blog
I have found, that with all the free courses that are available to the unemployed and disabled, plus grants etc for those who have no work commitments, then it is those who are tied to a job or family that need digital inclusion the most. It appears that if they can’t afford it then they can’t have it.
Speaking as one who is semi-retired I have to agree with Anthony. When I was in full time employment I was unable to go on courses and they were expensive, but now I’m able to go to most of the ones I want to. With people having to work well into their 60s these are the ones who really need to go on these projects and courses. They may use computers for their work but that is sometimes limited to particular aspects of the office software they use or their company has,