Deployment of Telework in European Public Administrations

Belgium, Luxembourg, Portugal and Spain
Despite the effort we spent on research activities, no reports about the implementation of telework
in a single bureaucracy could be obtained from these countries. The fact that the network of
experts and contacts we relied on could not identify cases in these countries, of course, does not
absolutely exclude the possibility of the existence of such practitioners. However, we may state
that a deployment of telework in public administrations in these Member States is close to zero.
Nevertheless, we gathered information regarding the conditions for the development of telework
in public administrations considering the position, activities and policies of major institutional
stakeholders. Moreover, singular examples of tele-cooperation and telematic strategies at the local
and regional level are presented, providing a potential for further changes in administrative
workstyles.
Belgium
A development of telework awareness in Belgium dates back to around the beginning of the
1990s. In the meantime, several large companies like IBM moved on from pilot trials and
implemented telework schemes involving up to 80% of staff. The Belgian TeleWorking
Association (BTA) was launched at the end of 1994. In the following years Belgacom opened a
first satellite office in Ghent with 90 employees from their former central office in Brussels. The
first telecentre, run by a company called Innotek, started operation in the town of Geel, providing
15 workplaces for employed and self-employed workers.
61
The Belgian unions have slowly
moved from a strictly defensive attitude towards telework to a position where they consider it as
negotiable.
According to local researchers, public administrations so far have not presented themselves as
telework practitioners. Nevertheless, the shift towards telematic applications, electronic public
services has affected the authorities. Changes in internal work organisation as well as with public
interaction can be expected.
‘High bandwidth government’ in Antwerp may be regarded as an example where it seems to be a
matter of definition, as to whether or not one feels inclined to see elements of ‘telework’. The
digitalisation of the local authorities which began in the 1990s has been elaborated in three
projects: MANAP, Telepolis, and DMA. Main motives for the digitalisation of the local
authorities have been attempts to catch up with IT development in the private sector and to
improve decision-making and interaction with the public.