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Susan Masswohl, a senior regulatory analyst in Ottawa who leads the BizPaL Plus project team with Natural Resources Canada Regulatory Affairs, says: "We have mapped out additional jurisdictions and sectors in B.C. and Saskatchewan. We will be mapping all the permits and authorizations required for the sectors in Manitoba, and next fiscal year in Alberta.
"The sectors that we are expanding and mapping with other jurisdictions are mineral exploration, forestry, oil and gas and other energy sub-sectors like wind - whatever is most important to the partner jurisdiction."
The Yukon government also sees other possibilities for BizPaL-type services. Amson says the territory is considering adapting a BizPaL-type infrastructure to the application process for business grants from the Economic Development department.
"BizPaL really demonstrates a different culture, in which everybody works well together, understanding that they maintain their autonomy" Amson says. "Many people talk about partnerships, but few programs deliver. I think that's the huge difference with BizPaL."
The difference has even been felt abroad. Ben Benoit reports that France and other countries have expressed interest in BizPaL, and Egypt is implementing a service that replicates it.
Benoit travelled to Egypt with an international agency last October and spent two weeks advising the Governorate of Alexandria on BizPaL concepts. The Egyptian service was scheduled for implementation early this year.
BizPaL received national recognition in Canada in late January when it was cited in a report by the Crossing Boundaries National Council as one of the few examples of successful collaboration across governments.
The report, entitled "Transformational changes and policy shifts in support of partnering b within, across and outside government," was prepared by the council's Private Sector Committee, based on interviews with 1,200 officials of governments and not-for-profit organizations, as well as a series of workshops during 2006.
It found that, despite isolated successes like BizPaL, governments in Canada are lagging in the development and use of partnership arrangements to meet citizens' expectations and deliver services across all levels of government.
Andy Blenkarn, vice-president of business transformation services for EDS Canada and chair of the Private Sector Committee, says a broader governance structure for cross-jurisdictional initiatives is needed if BizPaL is to advance to the next step - enabling online transaction services, so that business owners can pay for their permits online, not just find information about them.
Methodologies, tools and templates to form best practices in partnership arrangements are needed to overcome the reservations of some provincial ministers, who doubt that BizPaL can add business value without the transaction capabilities to integrate into their existing service systems, Blenkarn says.
"Where is the overall governance organization for BizPaL to embrace that broader strategy, and what would be the funding model to do it?" Blenkarn asks. "We need a governance body to map out the medium- and long-term strategy, the integrated architecture and partnership arrangements, from a technology as well as a business perspective. It's time to move on."
The Province of Ontario has a similar view. Ontario has embraced the BizPaL collaborative concept wholeheartedly and is taking steps to make the service available province-wide in the near future, says Amin Remtulla, director of e-channel development with Service Ontario, Ministry of Government Services, and a member of the BizPaL Steering Committee.
Several Ontario municipalities are considering implementing the service. The province wants to establish a critical mass of municipal users before BizPaL goes online within Service Ontario's portal.
Ultimately, BizPaL will be integrated within Service Ontario's information and business transaction systems. It will feed information to other sources, such as the Canada-Ontario Business Service Centres, to offer businesses a streamlined, end-to-end transactional capability to comply with business regulations, Remtulla says.
"BizPaL is definitely changing the way we are thinking about collaboration with other jurisdictions. Because of this project, we are building an expertise in this collaborative business model and have developed a framework that can extend to interactions with other jurisdictions.
"It's a watershed for us," Remtulla says. "And I hope other jurisdictions are seeing it the same way."
Lawrence Moule is a freelance writer based in Toronto. He can be reached atlmoule@sympatico.ca
Download the proceedings from Lac Carling 2006 here
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