In the last eight years, the Public Service has continuously felt the public’s pulse in order to decipher which services people use and which ones they want, and in order to radically change the way services are delivered to people. We have now reached a stage where servizz.gov has 23 one-stop-shops scattered around Malta, which were visited by 60,000 people in the first quarter of this year. Over the same period, more than 230,000 calls were received on 153, while the servizz.gov website had 300,000 visits.
This was stated by Principal Permanent Secretary Mario Cutajar when addressing a conference that discussed services as part of Public Service Week 2021. He stressed that service is the third element on which the new five-year strategy for the Public Service must be built. It is also the element that made the renewal of the Public Service successful. “We worked to improve it during the renewal process, and we will intensify our efforts on it during the strengthening process. The Public Service lives for the service it provides. This is the element through which we have gained people’s trust and the element we have invested most in,” said Mr Cutajar.
He added that quality goes hand in hand with service. The definition of quality, along with other systems such as mystery shoppers, Quality Labels, awards to public officers, and Quality Service Charters have greatly contributed to emphasising that service is measured by the level of its quality.
Mr Cutajar said that in addition to servizz.gov, quality of service in recent years has improved through the setting up of the People and Standards Division and the Institute for the Public Services. He stressed that a service of excellence means a smooth and seamless service for the customer, and that the Public Service now wants to create new services along with its existing ones.
“We need to envisage new and bigger services. Artificial intelligence will help greatly in the realisation of our dreams. We also need to fine-tune basic services, such as by answering customers not only during office hours but 24 hours a day. We must further strengthen the once-only-principle so that there’s no need for clients to provide information to the government more than once. There is a wealth of services we can provide. The opportunities are endless,” said Mr Cutajar.
